Following a rather hefty increase in government funding; a shiny new road has officially been given the green light. The 14.5 mile motorway-style road will feature the longest tunnel road in the country. And construction is set to begin next year.
The Lower Thames Crossing
Lower Thames Crossing is the name and significantly easing congestion around the Dartford Crossing is the game. The new route will almost double road capacity over the river, and could divert over 10 million annual vehicles away from the Dartford Tunnel.
The project was first proposed in the late noughties but only approved by the government in March 2025. The latest cash injection came courtesy of the Budget, when Rachel Reeves committed a further £891 million to the crossing. This funding will go towards the publicly-funded work taking place over the next few years.
The project is estimated to cost around £10.6 billion in total and take approximately six years to build. It’s been hailed the ‘largest road building project for a generation’, and it could be up and running by 2032.
A chunk of the road will connect the A2 and M2 in Kent with the A13 and M25 in Essex via a 2.6 mile route under the Thames that will become the country’s longest tunnel road. The crossing has also been designed to improve the connectivity between the south east, the Midlands, and the north of England.
National Highways (the driving force behind the project) have said that the Lower Thames Crossing will become the ‘greenest road in Britain’. 80% of the route will be inside a tunnel or hidden behind landscaped embankments to minimise its negative environment impact. The road will also boast seven new green bridges – one of which is set to be the ‘wildest’ in Europe.
Find out more about the Lower Thames Crossing project here.