Drinking coffee in Croydon surrounded by shit

He’d hoped it wouldn’t come to this, but by the time Eyo Itam received a letter from Thames Water instructing him that they would rip up his floor, the solicitor felt a pang of relief. 

For over a year, a vile smell had been rising up out the alley adjoining the drab concrete courtyard outside Norwood Junction station. The stench pried its way through the cracks in the doors to Itam's glass-fronted offices, leaving the employees of two artisanal coffee shops suffering migraines and baffled complaints from the locals. The stench was awful enough on its own. But once local residents learned what was causing it, many stopped using the alleyway altogether. 

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Itam received that letter around three years ago now, but since then the problem has only gotten worse. A drain leaking raw sewage into the alleyway has continued to torment local residents and businesses, despite repeated assurances from Croydon council that the issue had been resolved. Only last month, a child fell into the stream of effluent, sparking furious responses.

“Are we living in the Middle Ages? Why can’t they fix it?!” wrote one local resident, Harri Nosdoh, in a South Norwood Facebook group. As I began contacting local residents and travelling to the fated alleyway to investigate, everyone I spoke to had their own personal horror story to tell. The question I wanted to answer was the same as everyone else: how on earth has this happened? And who is responsible for fixing it?