The county's senior highways manager has defended Operation Brock - stating the traffic management plan has "proved its worth" this weekend.

For the past three days, motorists have been unable to use the coastbound M20 between Junction 8 for Maidstone and Junction 9 for Ashford.

Brock - and its controversial concrete barrier - is meant to allow traffic to flow in both directions on the motorway when lorries need to be stacked up.

Yet, much to the outrage of drivers, the 14-mile stretch between Maidstone and Ashford has been closed since Friday in an effort to ease congestion around Dover.

Despite coming in for a barrage of criticism from frustrated motorists, the traffic management scheme has been praised by Kent County Council's senior highways manager.

Toby Howe said: "This weekend, Operation Brock has proved why it is needed.

"At one stage we had probably 2,500 lorries held in there, if we didn't have Brock those lorries would have continued down the road to Dover.

Toby Howe discusses Operation Brock and travel disruption at Dover

"We would have had far more congestion. It would have been possibly similar to Christmas 2020 when we had lorries on every single road.

"So I think Brock really has proved its worth."

Kent residents and HGV drivers stuck in the county for more than 24 hours have been less than impressed by the handling of the situation.

The closure of the M20 has been branded "shambolic", while Dover suffered from severe congestion throughout yesterday as lorries remained stagnant on the approach to the port and were parking on streets around the town.

Commenting on Facebook, Neil D'Silva said: "Brock is a failure on the part of Highways England.

"It was designed so that non-freight traffic could still use the motorway with minimal disruption. An absolute shambles."

Meanwhile, Julie Moore wrote: "This system does not work at all. KCC needs to totally rethink Operation Brock as it’s not fit for purpose.

"Added to which locals become totally trapped. The chaos stretches back to J7. Totally ridiculous."

The troubles in Dover have begun to ease today, but waiting times for the ferries - and further back at Eurotunnel - remain lengthy.

As well as trying to manage those coming from the M20 and A20, authorities are trying to clear the backlog of lorries on the A2.

HGV drivers are meant to join the M20 at Junction 8 or face the threat of a £300 if they try to bypass Operation Brock.

But Mr Howe says rogue hauliers opted to use different routes - resulting in severe congestion on the A2.

"Of course there are lessons to be learned from this weekend," he said.

"One of the key problems was rogue HGVs that avoided the traffic management and took a lot of rural routes.

"We're going to speak with Kent Police and DVSA to see if we can bring in more enforcement to discourage that and really publicise it."

Mr Howe says a "perfect storm" resulted in the chaos seen this weekend.

Snow at the end of last week, storm damage to a DFDS ferry, an influx of people getting away for Easter and P&O not operating are the factors he has blamed on the trouble.

"All those things came together to really impact the plans that were already in place," he said.