There’s good news for motorists planning to head to the coastal ports this Easter weekend.

The southbound carriageway of the A249 has been re-opened ahead of schedule, after the current phase of planned works at the Stockbury roundabout near Sittingbourne were completed early.

National Highways said that work on the M2 London-bound off slip road is also close to being finished and will be opened before the weekend.

A spokesman for National Highways said: “Over the last five weeks, we’ve made huge progress on the southern section of our scheme, this includes the new A249 carriageways, and M2 London bound off-slip.

“We’ve also started on the new South Green link road, which will connect South Green Lane to the Stockbury Roundabout.”

The A249 southbound carriageway is now accessible from the new A249 southbound entry slip, located next to the Stockbury flyover.

The new Oad Street link to the Stockbury Roundabout will open on Saturday, April 6, with the upgraded road joining the roundabout directly, rather than the A249 southbound, which it is hoped will provide a safer route for traffic entering or exiting Oad Street.

National Highways is engaged in a £100m project to refashion the Stockbury roundabout and install a fly-over.

Construction is expected to take another nine months.