Hot topic: super-sewer

Hot topic: super-sewer

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BIG DIG: Thames Water works in Woolwich show what Carnwath Road residents can expect during the construction of a super sewer

Thames Water wants to use residential south Fulham as a 24 hour-a-day, 7 day-a-week construction site for at least six years for their £4.1 billion storage tank under the river. The proposals raise a series of issues including:

• The clogging up of already congested residential streets with 29,000 lorries
• The stench that will be created from gases caused by raw sewage in a densely populated residential area next to five local schools
• The £4.1billion cost of the scheme – which has more than doubled since 2002 and increased again despite assurances that it would not rise a penny over £3.6billion
• The disruption to local homes and business caused by 24 hour-a-day, 7 day-a-week construction work
• The loss of new homes and jobs on the riverside
• The lack of consultation on this site with local people
• Water-rates spiraling by at least £80 per year to pay for the scheme
• The 50 foot high stink pipe to let off sewer vapours that will be a permanent legacy of the scheme.

Hammersmith Embankment has also been targeted for a second smaller sewer construction site. Thames Water wants to dig-up land opposite Frank Banfield Park, on Chancellors Road, and has written to residents to say that the work will ‘inevitably cause disruption’.

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