Deal to turn airport into lorry park could be imminent
The Department of Transport is looking to sign a contract with the owners of Manston airport in Kent so it can be used as a lorry park.
Sections of the M20 have been gridlocked recently due to attempts by migrants to storm the Eurotunnel and disruption caused by striking French ferry workers in the port of Calais.
Kent Online said an announcement on plans to use the old airport, which closed in May 2014, as an overflow for Europe-bound lorries was expected later today.
It said the airport owners and DfT officials are on the verge of signing a three-month deal to provide space for several thousand vehicles.
Operation Stack, which turned the motorway into a de facto lorry park, has been lifted since Saturday morning, according to Kent police.
Eurotunnel has reported that some of its passenger trains from Folkestone are leaving later than planned although traffic is said to be running fairly smoothly. The website said it was operating with four departures per hour in both directions.
Roads minister, Andrew Jones, announced on Friday that a car park at Ebbsfleet International railway station in north Kent would be used to provide spaces for up to 1,000 lorries.
Britain and France have called for help from the EU in tackling the migrant crisis in Calais.
Nightly attempts by large groups of migrants in Calais to force their way through the rail tunnel linking France and Britain have disrupted services between the two countries.
"There are no easy solutions – and it is not for the UK and France to solve these problems alone," British interior minister Theresa May and her French counterpart Bernard Cazeneuve said in a joint letter published in the Sunday Telegraph.
An organised mob of 200 migrants charged into the Calais entrance of the Channel Tunnel early yesterday, chanting ‘open the borders’ and demanding to be allowed into Britain.
Diane
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