‘Weekly review’ of M20 contraflow

Highways bosses say they will decide whether to keep a contraflow system in place on the M20 on a week-by-week basis.

Officers said they will carry out a “rolling weekly review” of Operation Brock, which has been put in place on the motorway this week, in case the UK leaves the EU with no deal. A no-deal Brexit could cause travel chaos in Kent if lorries bound for the Port of Dover are subject to longer customs checks, causing a huge backlog of vehicles, which would then be parked on the M20.

Highways bosses said they were “content” with how motorists had coped with the new system introduced on Monday, which has seen part of the London-bound carriageway split to allow traffic to travel in both directions.

There was some travel disruption on Tuesday - between junctions 8 for Maidstone and 9 for Ashford - with one of the two lanes blocked by an accident and again later due to a broken down lorry. Meanwhile, the coastbound carriageway has remained virtually empty, having been set aside for lorries to queue on their way into Dover.

Ggetting rid of the scheme is likely to take up a whole weekend, with bosses warning it is “not designed to be activated and deactivated at the flip of a switch”.

John Kerner, the Highways England director responsible for implementing Operation Brock, said the decision to keep the scheme active will be made on a weekly basis.

He said: “If it’s considered later on this week that it’s still required for next week then it will stay on. At some point in the future there will be a decision to deactivate it, putting it back to normal traffic running coastbound and three lanes of traffic with the 24km of barrier on the London-bound carriageway. That takes time to enact as well. It’s not designed to be activated and deactivated at the flip of a switch.

“It takes a little bit of planning and preparation beforehand and as teams do it more frequently then the work rates will improve and it will be done more quickly. We’re likely to maintain activation and deactivation over the weekends to minimise disruption on road users in Kent.”