Pohang City Begins Site Selection for Municipal Crematorium Memorial Park

Construction of Modern Facility with Tree Burial and Columbarium on 30,000㎡ Site

[Asia Economy Yeongnam Reporting Headquarters, Reporter Park Dong-wook] The project to create a memorial park to replace the Pohang City Crematorium in Gyeongbuk, which was completed 80 years ago, is being actively promoted.

According to Pohang City on the 27th, the 'Memorial Park Installation Promotion Committee' held its first meeting on the 25th, reviewed the results of the municipal crematorium-related service conducted in 2019, and decided to select the site for the memorial park by October.

The committee consists of a total of 13 members: 3 ex officio public officials, 2 city council members, 3 funeral experts, and 5 local representatives. The chairman is Kang Chang-ho, chairman of the Heunghae-eup Development Advisory Committee.

Next month, the committee plans to visit other regional funeral facilities such as Sejong Milky Way Park and Ulsan Sky Park with citizen representatives, and prepare public recruitment criteria for the scale of the memorial park construction and site selection.

Pohang City plans to build a modern memorial park equipped with a tree burial area and columbarium once a 30,000㎡ site is selected through a public contest. Previously, Pohang City announced the 'Comprehensive Funeral Facility Installation Ordinance' for legislative notice in November last year, and this ordinance was promulgated at the end of February after approval by the city council.

Lee Kang-deok, mayor of Pohang City, said, "Compared to the increasing demand for crematoriums, Pohang City's funeral facilities are very poor with only four cremators," adding, "We will do our best to create a good facility that provides convenient funeral services by actively reflecting citizens' opinions."

In Pohang, the Uhyeon Crematorium (3 cremators), built in 1941, and the Guryongpo Crematorium (1 cremator), built in 1976, are in operation, but the combined maximum daily processing capacity of the two places is only 16 bodies. Pohang City's cremation rate relative to the number of deaths has been increasing annually from 79.1% in 2017 to 81.4% in 2018, and 84.6% in 2019.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.