Residents have suffered months of disruption “for no benefit” after work on rolling out superfast broadband to a Kent town was put on hold.

CityFibre’s contractors, Lanes Infrastructure Telecoms, have been instructed to restore all pavements and carriageways in Maidstone by the end of this week.

The news will be welcomed by many in the Allington area and in Queen’s Road, who have faced long delays and detours as a result of road closures which began in Janauary and were billed to last up to nine months.

But the announcement also casts doubt on whether Maidstone will now ever benefit from the £53 million superfast broadband connectivity project that the firm had promised.

A spokesman was noncommittal, saying: “Given the pace and scale of our nationwide rollout, we continually review the prioritisation of our deployment locations, considering a range of factors.

“As part of this review, we are working to agree on a managed exit of Lanes Group from our build programme.

“This requires us to pause a number of local builds while we determine our next steps.”

The spokesman said: “Our nationwide rollout is progressing well towards our 8 million household target with already over 3 million premises across the country now passed by our network.”

But the firm did not commit as to whether its project would still include Maidstone.

KCC has confirmed that it has been told by CityFibre that the roadworks in Queens Road are no longer required and that the company is filling in the remaining open trenches across the area, without the fibre connections being laid.

The scheme had promised to bring both upload and download speeds of 1,000 megabits per second to all homes and businesses in Maidstone by 2027.

Cllr Stuart Jeffery (Green) said: “It seems residents have suffered months of disruption for no benefit. It’s highly frustrating.”

It transpired earlier this week CityFibre has pulled out of contracts to provide superfast connections in other areas, including Weston-Super-Mare, Cheltenham, Gloucester, Bath and Worcester.

In February this year, the company began a “restructuring process” aimed at cutting 400 jobs from its 2,300-strong workforce.

County Cllr Chris Passmore (Lib Dem) said: “This is a very concerning situation, with some millions of pounds being spent this summer disrupting the lives of residents of Allington and Queens Road, to put in an incomplete ultrafast fibre pipework under our roads. Now I hear that 180 Lanes staff have had their employment terminated.

“Through talking to CityFibre representatives, my understanding was this was the first part of a £52 million private investment giving Maidstone businesses, schools and residents access to a communications network which could rival any city in the world.

“However these benefits were never properly communicated to the public and there were no discussions with businesses and the local community as to the best place to start this important investment.

“I sincerely hope that CityFibre will remain committed to this project, but that in future it is done with less disruption and the firm works with, rather than across, the grain of our local communities.”