I noticed 11 cement vaults lined up side by side near the lighthouse on the Leslie Street Spit. Some were carved with names and dates. What are they doing there? —Chris Sulway, Leslieville

The colossal five-kilometre landfill—most of it wheeled in from local demolition sites—is primarily made up of concrete detritus. An autopsy would reveal dismembered housing projects, road beds, some marble countertops and possibly chunks of the east Gardiner. But some of its more macabre parts (like the vaults you saw, which arrived this past December) are courtesy of funeral industry workshops. Usually, the vaults have been damaged during construction—dropped by a forklift or cracked in the back of a truck—rendering them unfit for their posthumous tenants. They may once have held bodily remains that were since moved from their graves, say, to a new family mausoleum. While recycling is mercifully not an option, the vacated tombs eventually wind up resting in peace in the city’s lakeside concrete graveyard.

• Categories: Architecture