On the road with Costain

The Costain Group has been awarded £138 million by the UK’s Highways Agency for the widening works to add extra lanes to the M25 and A2 near Dartford, Kent.

The new lanes will see improvements made to the M25 between Junctions 1b and 3 near Dartford, and the A2 between Bean in Kent and the M25 (M25/A282 junction 2).

The £138 million contract includes widening the M25 between junctions 1B and 3, south of the Dartford Crossing, from three to four lanes, a total distance of four miles. The £66 million project is the first from a number of proposed schemes to widen the remaining three lane sections of the M25.

The A2/A282 Dartford Improvement will see the A2 widened from three to four lanes between Bean and its junction with the M25/A282, a distance of 1.5 miles. The £72 million scheme includes link roads from the M25/A282 in the north to the A2 in the east.

The contract has been awarded under the Highways Agency’s Early Contractor Involvement Scheme, which brings the contractor in at an early stage to start designing and building the roads, taking into consideration issues such as lighting, noise and air quality.