'Immense interest' from airlines

According to the BBC, RiverOak predicts from 2024, Manston could handle up to 680,000 passengers a year, doubling to around 1.4 million in the two decades following.

Fellow RiverOak director George Yerrall added: “We felt the time had come for the parties to come together to negotiate a settlement of the ownership issues.

“We now look forward to focusing on securing development consent and making rapid progress towards the re-opening of Manston with all the economic and other benefits we believe it will bring.”

Yerrall added RiverOak’s DCO application had generated “immense interest” from airlines and freight operators, as well as local colleges and employers.

“Now we have secured the land, it will allow us to develop those relationships as far as we can while we wait to receive development consent,” said Yerrall.

Manston closed in 2014 and has remained shut to flight operators since.

In January, Manston hosted an exercise to test plans for border disruption in the event of a no-deal Brexit, which would see the site become a lorry park to alleviate disruption to major highways in Kent.