A consultation on plans to build a major new lorry park in Kent - to house lorries during Operation Stack disruption - starts this Friday.

The six-week consultation, which ends on September 23, covers the design of the new Stanford West lorry area.

The £250m park is being built to keep the M20 moving during disruption to cross-channel services, and comes after Kent roads faced 32 days of disruption last summer.

Operation Stack is the method of dealing with disruptions to cross-channel traffic, where lorries park along a closed M20.

Highways England says it will work closely with residents and businesses to minimise the site’s impact on the surrounding area.

The lorry park at Stanford West, on the M20 close to junction 11, was selected as the preferred site last month following a separate consultation between December last year and January this year.

Highways England project director Adrian Sheppard said: “This is a solution to the problems caused by Operation Stack that has been talked about for decades, but on which we have made a great deal of progress less than a year.

“Following our consultation earlier this year we have been working hard to refine our plans and are now keen to hear what people think about these.

"I encourage anyone who would like to understand more or ask questions to visit us at one of the public exhibitions we are holding.”

Stanford West, which will be used to park up to 3,600 lorries during disruption, should minimise the impact on the M20 and on the region’s other roads.

After receiving strong support during the previous consultation, Highways England is exploring whether to use the site to provide overnight lorry parking to stop lorries parking on roads not intended for their use.

Construction work is due to start as soon as possible, with spaces available from summer 2017.

Details of the consultation will be available from 6am on Friday on the government's consultation page or by searching for ‘Management of Freight Through Kent’ on the www.gov.uk website.