Winter weather delays excavation of human remains at downtown Guelph parking lot

For decades, bodies have rested under a parking lot in downtown Guelph, and Mike McCready doesn't think that's been a very respectful place for them to be.

McCready is an archeologist with the Kitchener-based Archaeological Research Associates Limited, which the city has hired to exhume human remains at the Baker Street parking lot in Guelph.

McCready has made it his mission to give the dead the dignity of a proper burial before work on a new development project begins. 

"I like to think of it as a way of recovering these people and giving them a better rest, because right now that they're not in a nice situation, they're under a parking lot," McCready said.

The site was an all-faith cemetery from 1827 to 1853 and it's estimated there were approximately 200 graves.

The city says on its website that in 1853, Guelph passed a new bylaw that banned human burials within town limits.

"When plans were made to move the remains from the old public burying ground to a new cemetery (Woodlawn Memorial Park), family members moved some burials but others, especially unmarked graves, remained," the city's website says.

The City of Guelph says human remains or bone fragments had been found at three different times since 2005.  All of the exhumed remains were reinterred at the Woodlawn Memorial Park in Guelph.

Site of future central library

The cemetery lands were owned by the Canada Company until 1879, when the city purchased it to create a public park.

Over the years, the property has been used as a park, bowling green, curling rink and it had commercial use including as the site of a bakery and a creamery before it became a parking lot in the 1960s. 

Now, the parking lot is set to become the location of a brand new central public library, two 13-storey residential buildings and a new urban square.

Before the new development can take place, however, the city needs to remove human remains at the site as part of a required archeological clearance mandated by the province.

So far, approximately 83 graves have been located at the site of the former cemetery. Of that total number, 37 have been excavated and 36 sets of human remains, which include intact skeletons and others are partial remains, have been found.

The remains will be reinterred at Woodlawn Memorial Park in a special area dedicated to "Guelph's early pioneers," a letter about the archeological clearance from the Ministry of Heritage, Sport, Tourism and Culture Industries says.

McCready says the names of those recovered now won't ever be known as the records are lost or partially incomplete.

There is no information to identify anyone buried at the location because while the Canada Company owned the land, a specific company didn't run it. 

"Even when you have a cemetery that was run by a specific group, often if it's been a couple of hundred years, the records are either damaged or lost or partially incomplete," McCready said.

"All you can really go on is physical characteristics. So we can identify things like age and height and biological sex. But that's about as much as we can do without doing genetic testing."

So far, one person has contacted the city about an ancestor whose remains may be buried under the parking lot. 

The winter weather delayed the excavation in December and into this month. The city said in a release on Tuesday that excavation work is now on hold for the rest of winter and will resume in April and work should be completed by June. The city noted about 65 per cent of the site has been excavated to date.

The City of Guelph regularly posts updates on its website of the work done at the parking lot including all human remains that are located.

McCready said his team considered using tents and continuing the work through the winter, but decided to wait until spring when conditions would be better. In the meantime, he said, the graves will be insulated and protected.