Special report by political editor Paul Francis

A permanent lorry park solution to the problems caused by Operation Stack led country transport chiefs to consider five possible sites in Dover, Folkestone and Maidstone, it has emerged.

Documents finally released by Kent County Council under the Freedom of Information Act show council chiefs eventually opted for its preferred site on 70-acres of land off the M20 at Aldington, near Ashford after ruling out the others on grounds of costs, planning constraints and access issues.

A confidential report dating back to 2007 shows that KCC’s efforts to find somewhere suitable were not confined to sites close to the port of Dover or the M20, with land at the Detling showground near Maidstone earmarked as a possible site. It would have been capable of storing 7,500 lorries - twice as many as the preferred site eventually opted for by KCC.

The Detling option was not pursued amid concerns over “operational problems” - not least “potential problems of lorry traffic going up to Detling Hill and having to stop and restart on the steep gradient due to queuing back from the entry to the park.”

KCC also feared that there could be “significant problems” over traffic congestion at junctions of the M20 and the M2, with a potential to have a knock on effect on Maidstone town centre.

The previously unreleased report contains an assessment of all five sites but identifies a series of problems with each - including the council’s preferred option.

It also shows three of the sites were either directly in or next to specially protected land, with one in an an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and another in the Kent Downs Special Landscape Area.

The five sites considered by Kent County Council were:

Site 1: M20 Junction 11, Stanford

Site 2: M20 Sellindge Converter Station (North)

Site 3:M20 Sellindge Converter Station (South) - KCC's preferred site

Site 4: A249 Detling Showground

Site 5: A2 Lydden, near A2 at Dover

Each presented problems that KCC concluded meant they were not viable.

However, the report also confirms there would be potential problems with the site it did choose, notably over access, saying its location on the London-bound M20 makes “access arrangements more complex.”

It also says a holding area might be needed on the other side of the motorway when lorries leave the park after Operation Stack is lifted.

On the site itself, KCC states: “The geology of the area...suggests poor foundations and there are large areas of water adjacent to the site with ecological aspects to consider. There are no significant planning constraints except for potential flood risk designation.”

Richard Honey, Ashford councillor and a member of the Lorry Park Alliance that opposes the Aldington site said:

“This report shows that KCC’s assessment of these sites has been superficial in the extreme and as a result we can have no confidence that they have properly considered all the sites and therefore no confidence that the Aldington site is the best one.”

Kent County Council was ordered to release details of its other options after a ruling by an information watchdog.

It followed a successful appeal by KM Group that had sought the information under the Freedom of Information Act and Environmental Information Regulations.