M26 motorway

M26 motorway
Route information
Length:	9.9 mi (15.9 km)
Existed:	1980 – present
Major junctions
West end:	Chevening
	M25 motorway Junction 5 M20 motorway Junction 3
East end:	Addington
Location
Primary destinations:	Sevenoaks
Road network
Roads in the United Kingdom Motorways A and B road zones

M26 looking east at junction 5. The A21 from Sevenoaks is crossing on the bridge in the foreground.

The M26 is a motorway in Kent, England. It provides a short link between the M25 at Sevenoaks and the M20 near West Malling.

Route

The motorway starts at junction 3 of the M20 and heads west, encountering almost immediately the single junction along its length where it has an interchange with the A20. This junction is numbered 2a to reflect its proximity to the M20's nearby junction 2 (also connecting with the A20) a short distance to the north-west.

8 miles (13 km) to the west the M26 merges with the M25 at junction 5. There is no exit from the M26 at junction 5 and all traffic must join the clockwise (westbound) M25. The next M25 junction, number 6, is 10 miles (16 km) west at Godstone, thus traffic joining the M26 at Junction 2a cannot leave the motorway for 18 miles (29 km) – the longest distance between motorway exits in Britain.^[1]

Travelling in the anti-clockwise direction from the M25, the main carriageway continues directly on to the M26 at junction 5. To remain on the M25, traffic must turn on to the slip road which connects to the M25 spur coming north from Sevenoaks (Which is the same with the A21). The awkwardness of junction 5 is a result of the history of the two motorways' planning and construction.

History

Map of Ringway 4 showing M26 as part of a single route with the M25

Construction of the M26 began in 1977, although a route on a similar alignment was originally proposed in the Greater London Plan in 1944 as part of proposed post war improvements to London area transport network. Those proposals were developed further in the 1960s as part of the London Ringways plan and the route of the M26 at that time formed part of Ringway 4 and would have been designated as part of the M25.

Construction of the first part of the M25 began in 1972 but before it opened, plans for the London Orbital motorway were modified to combine the southern and western part of Ringway 4 with the northern and eastern part of Ringway 3. To connect the two separate routes, which together were numbered as the M25, an additional section of road needed to be planned and the M25 route was diverted northwards from junction 5 to meet Ringway 3 at Swanley (M25 junction 3).

The remaining section of Ringway 4 became the M26.^[2] Until February 1986, the anticlockwise M25 simply became the M26 at Junction 5, as the M25 between Junction 5 and Junction 3 was not opened until then.

Proposed developments

Kent County Council has been in talks with the Highways Agency over a possible new junction with the A225, allowing direct access to Sevenoaks – or access to the A21 at the M25 junction.^[3]

Junctions

Data from driver location signs are used to provide carriageway identifier information.

M26 motorway junctions
miles	km	Westbound exits (B carriageway)	Junction	Eastbound exits (A carriageway)	Coordinates
0.0	0.0	Road continues as M25 around London	M25 J5	Start of motorway Dartford Crossing, London (S.E.) M25. Sevenoaks, Hastings A21	51°17′29″N 0°08′34″E / 51.29145°N 0.14282°E
8.6 9.3	13.9 15.0	Wrotham, Borough Green A20 Sevenoaks (A25) Paddock Wood (B2016)	J2a	Borough Green A20 Gravesend, Wrotham (A227)	51°18′07″N 0°20′06″E / 51.30207°N 0.33508°E
10.3	16.6	Start of motorway	M20 J3	Road continues as M20 towards Maidstone	51°18′26″N 0°21′32″E / 51.30733°N 0.35877°E
Notes Distances in kilometres and carriageway identifiers are obtained from driver location signs/location marker posts. Where a junction spans several hundred metres and the data is available, both the start and finish values for the junction are shown. Coordinate data from ACME Mapper.
1.000 mi = 1.609 km; 1.000 km = 0.621 mi

See also

• List of motorways in the United Kingdom

References

1. "Motorway Database – M26". CBRD. Retrieved 27 January 2007.
2. "The Motorway Archive – M26". Motorway Archive Trust. Retrieved 27 January 2007.
3. "Local Transport Plan". Kent County Council. Retrieved 27 January 2006. See 8.37 Improvement

External links

Route map: Bing / Google

• CBRD Motorway Database – M26
• The Motorway Archive – M26
• Pathetic Motorways – M26