The only allotments in Teddington will be turned into a graveyard, despite a petition signed by nearly 1,700 residents opposing the plans.

Richmond Council has rejected calls from locals to rethink plans to extend Teddington Cemetery onto Shacklegate Lane allotments to meet urgent demand for more burial spaces in the borough.

A petition urging the council to scrap the plans, which were approved in December, warned that once the works went ahead, the allotments would be "gone forever". It was signed by 1,697 residents.

The petition said: "Although we acknowledge that there is a need for further burial spaces, we believe that claiming back the Shacklegate Lane allotment site is just a short-term solution to the longer-term problem of burial space.

"We would like to see our council do what some other London boroughs have done and develop a long term and sustainable burial plan, including exploring options for creating burial space, that do not involve taking away allotment land."

Jane Cowling, presenting the petition, told the council's Environment Committee on Tuesday (March 24) residents felt strongly that the "needs of the living community, rather than the dead, should be given greater weight".

She said if the council would not preserve all of the allotments, it should keep a meaningful portion while putting together a long-term strategy with better solutions to tackle the lack of burial space in the borough.

The council granted planning permission for the cemetery to be extended onto the allotments in 1993, but only approved proposals to urgently carry out these works in December last year.

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Ms Cowling said: "This isn't just a piece of land. It's a living, breathing part of our community. Since the council first made the decision in the 1990s, the world has changed.

"People care more than ever about sustainability, about access to green spaces, about mental and physical wellbeing and about locally-grown food."

She added: "What we heard overwhelmingly from residents is simple. They do not want to lose this space. They don't want to see a vital green lung in our community replaced, especially when nearly half of the recent burials have been for non-residents."

Candace Taylor, from the Shacklegate Lane Allotment Association, said none of the residents she had spoken to "wanted to see a larger cemetery and all the allotments lost".

Ms Taylor said: "This isn't what they expect from their Lib Dem council, which claims to care about sustainability, and as a Lib Dem member, that's not what I expect.

"Partial conversion would show residents – your voters – that the council listens to public opinion and is innovative, flexible in finding solutions and adapts to changing views and issues."

Green councillor Caroline Wren, who has also petitioned against the allotment repurposing, said the borough was now facing circumstances very different to when it made the decision in 1993 – a climate emergency.

Councillor Wren said: "We should be managing our cemeteries sustainably so that they don't chew through fresh land. That is the ultimate long-term approach that we're probably going to have to take in this borough."

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But officers said there was no burial space left in Teddington, as the last plot had been sold, and the authority needed to move forward with the plans as quickly as possible to provide new plots for the borough while it looked for long-term solutions.

They told the meeting the council was investigating reusing existing burial plots to maximise space, but this would only be possible in the long term.

Matthew Eady, the council's Director of Culture and Leisure, said: "Very clearly, there's lots of love for the allotments, and they're also really important to the council as well, and we want to support those plot holders to find space within the borough.

"But we also equally need to ensure that there's sufficient places for people to be able to be buried."

Lib Dem councillor Julia Neden-Watts said officers had ruled it would not be "safe, convenient or appropriate" to carry out works on only part of the site.

She said the allotments "were provided on a temporary basis, and plot holders have known this, so this is not an unexpected moment in time".

The extension is set to provide around 616 new burial spaces at the cemetery and would be used up in around 30 years. Planters would be installed next to the plots for use as community growing spaces.

Officers confirmed allotment holders will be offered alternative space in the borough.