Sewers don’t work from original design When our Victorian ancestors started building sewers they decided to combine both sewage and surface water in the same system. Indeed, storms were almost considered a good thing because they flushed the system through. In more recent times we have begun to place more importance on the quality of the water around our shores and in our rivers. However, we are still largely stuck with that original decision to combine sewage and surface water. Nowadays there are far more paved surfaces, especially in our towns and cities which means far more surface water th…