In some areas of the Qarafa , particularly the Imam al-Shafi ' i district , permanent habitation for the living was less frowned upon and even received some help from the government . In 1907 , the neighbourhood of Imam al-Shafi ' i was connected to the rest of Cairo by a streetcar line which stretched from here to the Pyramids in Giza ( though it no longer exists today ) . Later , during Nasser 's presidency in the 1960s , the government even built public housing on the edge of the Imam al-Shafi ' i neighbourhood to house some of the people displaced by the construction of the Salah Salem highway , and some schools were also built . By 1947 , the census had calculated the population of the districts including the cemeteries at 69,367 , with population density having increased by a large factor . During the second half of the 20th century , rapid urbanization and the modernization of industries in and around Cairo lead to a massive migration that the city was ill-equipped to handle . The intensified urbanization of Cairo itself , and the exclusion of the poorest from government initiatives , resulted in a more urgent need for informal or improvised housing . Just as elsewhere in Cairo , this involved the construction of unofficial housing without government approval in areas where people could find space to build - or where they were able to demolish or incorporate older structures . Moreover , the cemeteries were already filled with structures built to house family tombs - some of them quite sumptuous - which were well-suited to provide improvised housing for the homeless and displaced . In 1966 the government banned anyone from staying in the cemeteries after sundown , but were unable to enforce this . The destruction of the 1992 Cairo earthquake was another instance that forced many people to move into family tombs , thus adding to the number of people already living in the City of the Dead
1992 Cairo earthquake
1992 Cairo earthquake
City of the Dead (Cairo)