Work ongoing to add parking, storage at Pioneer Cemetery

Construction is underway on a short-term project that aims to bring more parking spaces and a new maintenance storage area to the city-owned Pioneer Cemetery.

The nearly $350,000 project, which began last month just inside the entry gate off Sunol Boulevard, is expected to be completed in March, according to Becky Hopkins, assistant to the city manager.

“Pleasanton Pioneer Cemetery site and maintenance improvements are a City Council priority,” Hopkins said. “This project specifically is going to support the ongoing maintenance of the cemetery as well as the ability to provide new parking for the site.”

The city, which purchased the mid-1800s-era cemetery from the Independent Order of Odd Fellows (IOOF) for $1 in 2006, identified the need for more parking and storage onsite as part of the Pleasanton Pioneer Cemetery Master Plan adopted by the council in November 2014.

City officials later devised the small project now under construction, to add four new parking spots on the front-right portion of the cemetery along with a storage area to keep a backhoe, new concrete burial vaults, soil and equipment for graveside services such as chairs and canopies, Hopkins said.

The project is not disturbing any existing gravesites, and it is designed not to interfere with future key cemetery improvements contemplated in the master plan, she added.

Hopkins noted the master plan also recommended parking along the roadway, but after further review, roadside parking was deemed infeasible due to interments too close to the edge of roadway.

The estimated $346,760 project is funded through the city’s capital improvement program budget.

Pioneer Cemetery is located at 5780 Sunol Blvd., next door to private St. Augustine Catholic Cemetery and about a half-mile from the Sunol Boulevard exit off Interstate 680.

The burial ground has a long history in Pleasanton.

Formerly known as Pleasanton Memorial Gardens, the cemetery was first established in 1850 as a non-endowment cemetery and then purchased by the IOOF about three decades later. Many of Pleasanton’s founding pioneers are buried there, including the Kottinger and Neal families, as well as 400 military veterans.