History, as we know, cannot preserve the smells of cities. However, we can imagine what Moscow smelled like in the past. Until the end of the 19th century, the city had no sewage system, and all waste was dumped directly onto the streets, creating a terrible stench. Newspapers of that time reported on this. In the 1871 issue of "Russian Leaflet," it was noted: "Booths resembling urinals are unpleasant to approach. Often entire streams of foul waste flow onto the streets. The latrines are made of wood, which has rotted and is soaked with filth; disinfection is not carried out."

The situation began to change in 1874 when engineer Mikhail Popov presented a sewage project to the City Duma. Engineer Gobrecht, who had previously built a drainage system in Berlin, was invited for consultation. He disapproved of Popov's project and proposed his own, which involved raising the streets to lay pipes. However, both projects were rejected due to high costs.

Work on creating a sewage system only began in 1892 when the idea of Vsevolod Kastalsky was approved. He proposed an economical and simple method of waste disposal, a flow sewage system. The system quickly paid for itself due to connection and usage fees. As Moscow's population grew, it was expanded. By 1913, up to 6 million buckets of liquid waste were pumped out daily, which were discharged onto "irrigation fields" near the Lyublino and Lyubertsy stations.

During the Civil War, the situation worsened: due to devastation and poverty, foul streams flowed through Moscow again, and the networks periodically broke. Fortunately, a large stock of pipes had been accumulated before the revolution. Complete coverage of Moscow with a sewage system was only finished in the 1930s when pipes were immediately laid to new districts. Gradually, the stench disappeared from the streets of the capital.