Some Victorian-era cemeteries in central London have already begun to turn away new burials, and many others throughout the country are nearly full. Now, from the land of those charming double-decker buses comes a revolutionary idea for dealing with the problem of cemetery overcrowding: double-decker graves.

Under the proposed plan, remains would be exhumed and re-interred in a small casket. Using a method called “lift and deepen,” remains would be buried up to three meters (approximately 10 feet) deep, with one set of remains buried on top of another Exhumation would be limited to remains more than 100 years old, and then would take place only with permission from descendants of the dead, if they can be located.

Home Office Minister Paul Goggins said the plan is likely to run into strong resistance, mainly on religious grounds, and interviewers found that visitors at one 150-year-old cemetery were indeed uneasy with the notion of reusing graves. One woman acknowledged that reusing graves to save space makes sense on a practical level; nevertheless, she found the idea to be “quite disturbing.” According to the Government, reusing graves would not only open more space for burials, but also provide income for cash-strapped cemeteries.

Plans to survey all 25,000 burial grounds in England and Wales this year for space shortages and other problems come nearly three years after Members of Parliament (MPs) recommended recycling long-forgotten graves to save historic cemeteries from decline.

About 72 percent of the 600,000 people who die in the UK each year choose cremation over burial. But MPs warn that unless the space shortage in cemeteries is resolved, most people will no longer have a choice.