Part of the A249 is to be coned off for five months as work continues on the multi-million-pound Stockbury flyover.

The Maidstone-bound dual carriageway will be whittled down to one lane until February between the Stockbury roundabout and Rumstead Lane.

National Highways will be implementing the closure from next Friday (September 29), until early February 2024.

There will also be regular overnight (8pm to 5am) lane closures on the A249 Sheppey-bound between Rumstead Lane and Honeycrock Hill during the same period for works on the central reservation.

The central reservation and carriageway improvements announced are designed to reduce congestion and improve journey times.

They are the latest stages in the £92 million project which will see a flyover built at Junction 5 of the M2 at Stockbury, for traffic travelling between Maidstone and Sittingbourne/Sheppey.

This weekend there is a full closure of the A249 Sheppey-bound between the M20 junction 7 and the Stockbury roundabout from 9pm on Friday (September 22), until 5am on Monday, September 25.

This will allow National Highways to move traffic onto the new Sheppey-bound slip road and open the dedicated slip to the M2 coastbound.

During the closure a diversion will be in place via the M20, A229 and M2.

For non-motorway traffic, motorists are being urged to use the A249, A229, A2 and A249.

Dan Rollinson, project lead for the M2 Junction 5 scheme, said: “We know there’s never a good time to complete this kind of work on a busy road like this and understand this lane closure may cause disruption to journeys, for which we apologise.

“Taking a lane out of operation for a solid block of time, as opposed to just closing it at night or fully closing the road, means we can complete this essential part of the scheme as safely and efficiently as possible, with the least disruption.”

To find out more about the work to improve junction 5 on the M2, click here.

Live traffic information can be found on the National Highways website or by calling the agency’s customer contact centre on 0300 123 5000.