The Brexit lorry park by Sevington is now open, although construction work has still not been finished according to Kent Online.
Lorry drivers heading for Europe have been directed to the Sevington lorry park in order to receive the Covid-19 tests required for them to enter France. The testing centre is up and running and there are no reports of any delays.
Meanwhile, construction of the lorry park continues. Weather problems have left workers unable to lay enough tarmac down, which has put back the full opening of the facility.
This site is located to the south-east of Ashford at junction 10a of the M20 and should be able to accommodate 1,700 lorries, according to the information the UK Government provided in 2020.
However, Ashford MP Damian Green has told Kent Online that it can currently hold lorries in the hundreds, which means it is short well short of full capacity at this moment in time.
Source: DfT
The reason for opening the site before it is complete is to clear the M20 motorway and provide drivers with a safer and more convenient place for coronavirus tests before driving to the Eurotunnel or the port of Dover.
In the last week, several new test places have been opened to avoid congestion of lorries at the border. There are 25 sites in the UK that carry out COVID-test for lorry drivers. The list is as follows:
Burtonwood (Merseyside) 6am to 10pm
Carlisle Stobart Truck Stop 4am to 10pm
Charnock Richard Services northbound 6am to 10pm
Cherwell Valley 6am to 10pm
Doncaster North 6am to 10pm
Donington Park 6am to 10pm
Fleet southbound 6am to 10pm
Formula Services (Ellesmere Port) 6am to 10pm
Hartshead Moor (Huddersfield) 6am to 10pm
Heywood Distribution Truck Stop 6am to 10pm
Hopwood Park 4am to 10pm
Junction 38 Services 6am to 10pm
Leicester Forest East southbound 6am to 10pm
Membury eastbound 6am to 10pm
Peterborough 4am to 10pm
Reading Eastbound 24 hours
Rothwell Truck Stop 6am to 10pm
Rownhams northbound 6am to 10pm
Rugby Stobart Truck Stop 24 hours
Sandbach southbound 6am to 10pm
Sutton Scotney southbound 6am to 10pm
Tamworth Services 6am to 10pm
Thurrock Services 6am to 10pm
Watford Gap southbound 6am to 10pm
Wetherby Services 6am to 10pm
Meanwhile, the Port of Dover continues to be quiet as significantly fewer trucks than normal are going in and out of the port. Things are nonetheless expected to change within the next week or so.
Photo for illustrative purposes only, credits @ Rt Hon Grant Shapps MP/ Twitter