The Lower Thames Crossing (LTC) is “doomed to fail”, according to one politician.

Green Party MEP for the south east Keith Taylor responded to Highways England’s new consultation, the third such process, which launched last Wednesday.

A member of the European Parliament’s Transport Committee Mr Taylor, from Essex, said the government’s approach to transport planning was “antiquated”.

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His comments came just days after the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) issued a stark warning that we have just 12 years to limit climate change before its affects become significant and permanent.

He said: “The new LTC is doomed to fail even on its own terms; inducing traffic rather than reducing congestion.

"The government’s own figures reveal the proposal will put at least an extra 55,000 vehicles a day on the county’s roads.

“Despite the latest IPCC report and the reality that transport is the UK’s single most climate-destructive sector, the project turns a blind eye to the urgent reality of the climate breakdown.

"It also ignores an illegal and toxic air quality crisis linked to more than 700 preventable deaths every year in Kent and rides roughshod over local communities.

"We need breathing cities, not never ending road building projects that fail to deliver the integrated and effective solutions people actually want.”

The 14.5-mile three-lane route between Kent and Essex would plough through the countryside east of Gravesend and could help remove 14 million vehicles a year from the creaking Dartford Crossing.

A previous government report said it could boost the economy by £8 billion and create 6,000 jobs.

But Mr Taylor says the estimated £6 billion cost of the project could be better spent on “innovative and truly sustainable twenty-first-century alternatives”, including projects to move freight from the roads onto the railways and waterways.

He added: “We also urgently need investment in integrated and affordable public and active transport networks, directed by local communities, which will reduce traffic and markedly improve the quality of life for residents in Kent and beyond.”

Residents have until Thursday, December 20, to have their say on the proposals.

Click here to have your say.