Drivers face summer of delays at Port of Dover as French step up border checks

Drivers heading to Europe via Dover experienced long delays across the weekend of 22-24 July after increased security checks were introduced at Calais in the wake of the terrorist incident in Nice. Kent Police warn that the disruption could last for weeks due to the convergence of large volumes of summer holiday traffic and the increased thoroughness of French border checks.

At its worst motorists queued for 14 hours through Kent to get to the Port of Dover, with many holidaymakers having to spend the night into their cars. Kent Police distributed for stranded motorists.

There were waiting times of up to 12 hours for traffic arriving via the A20/M20 and up to three hours on the A2/A256. Once at the port drivers faced an additional wait of two hours.

Port officials said delays resulted from understaffing of the French border posts. By the Sunday UK Border Force staff were also deployed at the border posts. While they were not able to conduct passport checks, they were able to help French officials searching vehicles.

The queues persisted through Sunday as more travellers arrived at while the port was still dealing with Saturday's backlog.

The delays for motorists eased today (Monday) with the Port of Dover reporting there were no longer queues at the port but advised allowing plenty of time for travel.

Motorists have been advised to check with travel operators before making trips and to bring extra food and water.

The Freight Transport Association (FTA) has said that now is the ideal opportunity to consider the feasibility of the proposed lorry area near Stanford being made available for tourist traffic if needed in order to keep the M20 moving.

FTA head of policy for South East England Natalie Chapman said: “We do need to solve the root causes of congestion and delays at the Port.  Given the recent terrorist attack in Nice, FTA fully understands the need for heightened security and additional checks, but it is unforgiveable that the French border force was so under-resourced.

“Dover is vital to the UK economy with up to £120bn worth of trade going through the port every year. There must be better processes put in place at the Port with extra personnel drafted in at peak times, otherwise there is a risk that Operation Stack may be introduced and we cannot have a repeat performance of last year.”

Highways England is due to be consulting on the details for the design and operation of the new site adjacent to the M20 to alleviate Operation Stack for lorry drivers in the coming weeks.

"FTA believes that now is a good time to look at all possible scenarios and offers an opportunity to consider the feasibility of the site being made available for tourist traffic if we had a similar situation in the future,” said Chapman.

The main objectives of the proposed lorry area has to be to keep the M20 running and Kent open for business.The Stanford site would provide basic welfare facilities for professional drivers, but if this can be translated to tourist traffic in a workable way, it would help meet those objectives too.

Chapman added: "The site at Stanford will accommodate up to 3,600 lorries which is stages 1 and 2 of Operation Stack, but it could hold many more cars.  However, we would need to ensure that tourist and freight traffic are separated. The peak days for tourist and freight traffic are different - with tourists heading to the continent across weekends and lorries leaving the UK mid-week."