Brighton street brought to a halt by sewer collapse in 1985

The Victorian sewer collapsed in April 1985 outside Vokins store, now Moss, Size? And TK Maxx, in North Street, leaving a cavity measuring 15 feet by 25 feet.

“You could comfortably have got a double decker bus down there,” borough engineer Mike Kearns told The Argus at the time.

(Image: The Argus) “It's a good job we found it when we did because the sewage was washing the ground away and the hole would have gone on getting bigger.”

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The hole took weeks to fix (Image: The Argus) Work to repair the hole continued for several weeks with traders complaining that business had fallen by up to a half.

Andrew Vokins, from the store, told The Argus: “We thought customers might have the message now that the shops are open for business. It is disappointing and we are sore about the loss of trade.”

The collapsed sewer outside Hanningtons department store Brighton circa 1980s (Image: The Argus) Another hole, circa 1980, also opened up outside what was Hannington’s department store in the heart of The Lanes.

Dubbed the Harrods of Brighton, the store employed more than 200 staff across 70 different departments and dominated North Street for nearly 200 years.

Do you remember the collapses or the shops that used to line North Street?