Lhe paths of the Bordeaux Chartreuse cemetery are still sparse, this Wednesday, October 30. For All Saints’ Day, they will be filled with the living, coming to the bedside of the dead, like every year, like everywhere in France. Christophe Drapeau, around forty years in the funeral service of the city of Bordeaux, walks from slab to slab. His task? Manage the takeover of concessions among the 57,000 or so in the municipality spread over the three sites (Chartreuse, Bordeaux Nord and Les Pins Francs). Taking back a concession is the only way, with the creation and extension of cemeteries, to renew the supply of graves.
Christophe Drapeau takes care of reselling the concessions taken over. This chapel has just been purchased and has been completely restored.
Fabien Cottereau / SO
The operation is simple: Christophe Drapeau identifies the oldest tombs, in a state of abandonment, which can be recovered – “The advantage in the Chartreuse is that there is an embarrassment of choice! » – he checks the registers to see if any heirs can be contacted. A sign is then placed on the chosen grave and the descendants of the deceased have one year (1) to come forward. At the end of the term, the team of gravediggers can recover the bones, place them in the general vault (formerly the ossuary), and offer the concession in its original state for sale – which costs, despite the work, much less than a new burial.
The parallel increase in demographics in the Bordeaux metropolitan area (773,542 in 2005, 831,534 in 2021 according to INSEE) and the increase in the number of deaths in France over the past twenty years (519,470 in 2004, 631,000 in 2023 according to INSEE) which, according to forecasts, should increase over the next two decades due to the aging of the baby boom generation, does not scare the municipal employee. “In Bordeaux, we have been anticipating all of this for years. We organized ourselves to create a rotation and the concession takeover system works very well. We sell between 80 and 100 at Chartreuse each year. Of the three cemeteries, 2,700 have been carried out in twenty years, including around 2,000 on this site alone. »
Fabien Cottereau / SO
Descendants now have one year instead of three to report after the sign indicating the state of abandonment has been placed on the tombstone. Once the deadline has passed, the concession can be resumed.
The trigger of Covid
If the situation is not critical in Bordeaux, the municipal employee recognizes it, it is rather an exception. “The cemeteries of certain municipalities in the metropolis are starting to reach their limit, and the extensions are not infinite. » An observation which was accentuated during the Covid pandemic. From 2020, the Metropolis decided to commission a study from the public planning agency A-urba on the cemeteries in the area. The observation of this state of affairs is clear: “The capacities of municipal and intercommunal cemeteries are being reduced. » And this despite the constant increase in the cremation rate, 40% today.
Fabien Cottereau / SO
The Chartreuse cemetery in Bordeaux is preparing to receive many visitors for this All Saints’ Day weekend.
The study, carried out by the deputy mayor of Bordeaux Dimitri Boutleux, a professional landscaper, and under the direction of Jean-Christophe Chadanson, projects around 70,000 burials between 2020 and 2039. In the different scenarios studied, the saturation of cemeteries arrive, at the earliest, if nothing is done, at the end of 2025, at the latest, at the end of 2031. Except one: when the resumption of concessions increases, saturation is avoided.
Fabien Cottereau / SO
Certain tombs, objectively in a state of abandonment, are voluntarily not taken back because of their heritage interest or a location considered inappropriate for a concession takeover.
Pooling
Aware of the emergency, the Metropolis created a funeral directorate to manage the various municipalities. “Today we lack data, which limits our ability to anticipate,” laments Dimitri Boutleux. But pooling at the intercommunal level has notably enabled the establishment of a purchasing center, which reduces the cost of the work. We also want to pool the trenching market. But the most important thing is to establish a dialogue between the municipalities on this subject, and the sharing of skills. »
The Metropolis mentions several other solutions put in place by the municipalities: acceleration of the resumption of concessions, co-financed by the agglomeration, limitation of concession durations, end of perpetual durations, cessation of sales in advance. In the two intercommunal cemeteries, the installation of burial vaults (above-ground vaults which can be stacked) is also being studied.
Fabien Cottereau / SO
The famous statue of the reaper was recently restored by the town hall.
“It’s been a while since municipalities have become aware of the problems of space in cemeteries,” underlines Alèxe Duvaut, doctoral student in political science in Bordeaux and specialist on the subject. “On the other hand, the financial aspect is a real limit: managing a cemetery is very expensive for a town hall. Especially since 2021, municipal funeral taxes [redevance perçue par la collectivité pour chaque inhumation, NDLR]which could help certain municipalities, are prohibited. »
(1) The deadline was three years until the entry into force in 2022 of the 3DS law, which shortened the procedure with the aim of accelerating the takeover of concessions to precisely avoid the risks of saturation of cemeteries. It also includes the obligation to notify the family of the deceased “by all means”.
