Surprise! Sprinter handbrake / parking brake

Grovelling under my Bourton removing the fresh water tank I took no notice of the handbrake cables. There are two of them which ran as one would expect, from the centre of the chassis, one to each rear wheel hub. Then I almost fell over - which would have been difficult as I was lying on the ground. The two handbrake cables terminate at a plastic block in the centre of the chassis, and there is no cable from there forwards to the driver's cab.
"Well, of course there isn't" I thought to myself, "it has an electric parking brake and no handbrake lever."
So why do they install handbrake cables when there is no handbrake? Is there an option I wonder, of retro-fitting a handbrake and doing away with the awful automatic electric parking brake? I say awful - and you would too if you saw the process of putting the wagon in gear and getting it going. They have cleverly positioned the 'release parking brake' switch on the dashboard directly forward of the steering wheel spoke so you have to peer around it, and choose the switch with the logo on it, from the choice of switches with different logos. There is a bright red LED logo on the instrument panel telling you the parking brake is on, but no, they couldn't replicate that red LED logo on the parking brake switch hidden behind the steering wheel could they? That would make it too easy to find.

Answers on a postcard to:
Bewildered,
Lutterworth Nursing Home

My new(ish) car has got an electric handbrake, but I confess I've never looked at how that works. Is the central mechanism just there so that they can use a single actuator rather than one per wheel?

I admit I don't like the electronic handbrake - it's either on or off, with no way to gently apply it, which is annoying at traffic lights with a slight downward slope. It means you have to use the footbrake before applying the handbrake, which is a bit unpleasant for the person right behind you...

There is no central mechanism to the cables. I did think of that, and inspected it. The two cables run to a position on the chassis which would normally accommodate a pivoting mechanism with one cable running from there to the hand brake in the cab. These cables are just fixed to a do-nothing block of plastic. Which means that if the cables weren't there, you could fit a much bigger fresh water tank in their space. Grrr.