May 2013 - Parks & Recreation - 51

preserving the past and preparing for
the future. "
" The strategy was to make things as
simple and definable as possible, " says
John Burt, who oversaw many of the
renovations as Kissimmee's park superintendent from 1998 to 2005. According to Burt, a major component allowing the city to simplify many processes
was the use of GIS, GPS and aerial
technology.
First, the city completely resurveyed
and replatted the entire cemetery, adding 7,000 new burial sites and making
it possible for staff to locate any plot
within six inches of error. Additionally, Rose Hill became one of the first

cemeteries in Florida to install a computer-based touch screen - accessible
during non-staffed evening hours - for
searching exact grave locations.
Loubier emphasizes the significant
role their GPS, GIS and aerial records
played after a hurricane devastated the
cemetery in the mid-2000s.
" We had 140 trees that had to be torn
down...and many monuments were
tipped over, damaged or moved around, "
Loubier says. " But we were able to replace all the headstones in the right location, even to the
point of knowing if
the headstone was
in the center rather

than the foot of the grave...and it was all
because of the replatting process we had
done in the mid-1990s. "
Business Planning
The $600,000-plus in annual revenue
generated through both interment fees
and monument sales fully supports
Chestnut Grove Cemetery, a 25-acre
site managed by Herndon, Virginia, Parks and Recreation. Cemetery
Manager Mike Moore credits careful
trend analysis as critical to establish-

Alexandria, Virginia, is currently developing a new park to honor
the resting place of 1,800 African Americans who fled to the city
to escape bondage during the Civil War. Forgotten for decades,
the burial ground located in the downtown area was once used
to inter these freedmen (known then as " contrabands " )-many of
whom were Union soldiers.
All the troops interred at the site were moved to Alexandria
National Cemetery in 1865; however, archaeological studies
done between 1996 and 2007 identified 500 still existing graves.
Archaeologists also discovered a 13,000-year-old Paleoindian
Clovis point, suggesting the site's prehistoric significance.
Ron Kagawa, division chief for park planning, design and
capital development, asserts in-depth pre-planning as key to a
historic cemetery project.
" The cost of a project is not constructing it. The cost of a project is maintaining it over time, " he says. " It is critical to consider
how the site will be maintained and sustained during the design phase - not after it's constructed. "
Additionally, Kagawa notes the contributions made possible by
the archaeological and historical research, which include the creation of a spatial-mapping tool and information database of each
grave, as well as the development of guidelines for the construction process.
As with any project, there are constraints, and the challenge,
Kagawa believes, is to find opportunity in them. To this effect,
the city conducted a memorial design competition in 2008 and

Mario Chiodo works on a section of
the Alexandria cemetery memorial.

Re-Honoring the Dead:
Contrabands and Freedmen's
Cemetery Memorial Project

a public art competition in 2012. Designs submitted by Alexandria architect C.J. Howard have been used as the framework
for the memorial, which will also commemorate the dead with
a 9,500-lb. bronze sculpture by California artist Mario Chiodo
titled " The Path of Thorns and Roses. "
The memorial is scheduled to open in 2013.
Principal partners include the Office of Historic Alexandria; the Transportation and Environmental Services Department; the Department of
Recreation, Parks and Cultural Activities; and the Friends of Freedmen's
Cemetery. Additional funds were provided by the Federal Highway Administration, the Virginia Department of Transportation and a grant
from Save America's Treasures, a public-private partnership of the National Park Service and the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

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May 2013 - Parks & Recreation

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