London Sanitation

On the way to the WSUP event in London it was good to see the final touches being put to the visible elements of Thames Tideway, the amazing 'super sewer' costing well over $5billion which has been built under the Thames river to capture all the storm overflows from London's Victorian era brick-built sewers. Balagette's amazing system working so well but being challenged 160 years on by growth in population and hard surfacing and different expectations of river quality.

This is the view of the works at Blackfriars Bridge where the once Fleet River and associated sewers are being channelled into the Tideway Tunnel 54 metres down.

The extension to the embankment to house the drop shaft to the tunnel will remain once all the works are completed. I was intrigued to see what look like overflow flap valves in this 'new embankment'. They look to be too small to be anything to do with the tunnel itself being overwhelmed in a storm, perhaps something to do with drainage of this embankment extension.

But a reminder that even after spending billions the new tunnel is only expected to deal with 95% 'of the sewage spills that 'previously would have polluted the river'.