Mondo Knows Facts

Bazalgette built London's sewers after the Great Stink

More than 1,800 kilometres of brick tunnels carried waste out of the city After a hot summer in 1858 made the Thames in Parliament so foul that curtains were soaked in lime, MPs funded a drainage scheme. Joseph Bazalgette, chief engineer of the Metropolitan Board of Works, built interceptor sewers along both banks and pumping stations downstream. His system still forms the backbone of London's drainage. It sits in Mondo's history collection, one of 200 facts that each trace back to the reference below.

Where this comes from

Institution of Civil Engineers

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Tags: sewers, london, engineering

Bazalgette built London's sewers after the Great Stink: the short answers

Where does this come from, and can I check it?
More than 1,800 kilometres of brick tunnels carried waste out of the city. The figure is taken from Institution of Civil Engineers, which is linked in full on this page. Every fact on Mondo Knows names its source rather than repeating an unsourced claim.
Is this really a history fact?
Yes. It sits on the History shelf, one of 2,600 sourced facts grouped into space, animals, the human body, history, science and more. Category pages collect every fact in the same field.
What else can I read about it?
The links under the fact point to a quiz, game, puzzle or calculator on the same subject, and the shelf below shows related facts. The wording here is original, and quoted phrases are marked as quotations.