News that the South East Local Enterprise Partnership (SELEP) has helped secure funding to improve Junctions 6 and 7 on the M20 in Kent has been welcomed by the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) South East England Region
But the Institution has warned that similar investment is needed elsewhere in the county to maximise benefits for the economy.
Director of ICE South East England, John Laverty, said: “ICE South East England welcomes the announcement this week that £0.3 million is being spent improving Junctions 6 and 7 on the M20 as the projections are that this work will support several development sites in the area by reducing congestion and making them more accessible.
“Those projections show that for a relatively small sum of money spent on infrastructure around 10,400 jobs will be created and more than 8,400 new homes can be built by 2020.
“Our congratulations go to SELEP for the work it has done to secure this investment and we hope they will be similarly successful with other schemes on their ‘shopping list’ of infrastructure improvements.”
He added: “Our only concern is that this work is not anticipated to start until 2014 so the benefits won’t begin until 2015 at the earliest. This reinforces ICE’s message that investing in infrastructure brings benefits now and in the future.
“We believe that similar benefits can be generated in a cost effective way by investing relatively small sums in infrastructure projects elsewhere in the county and we hope that we will soon see funds released to allow such projects to go ahead.”
ICE South East England has more than 11,000 members living and working in the region. More information can be found at www.ice.org.uk/see. You can follow ICE South East England on Twitter: @ICE_SEEngland