Rochester, Kent the M2 motorway and the High Speed 1 railway line bridge the River Medway. Bus services are operated by Arriva Southern Counties, which took over the locally owned Maidstone & District bus company in the 1990s. Other local bus companies including Nu-Venture provide certain services, some contracted from the local council. Rochester railway station is on the Chatham Main Line and the North Kent Line. Strood railway station is on the North Kent Line and the Medway Valley Line; it links to the HS1 high speed line at Ebbsfleet International giving a running time of 30 minutes into St Pancras.
Maidstone the river to allow clothes to be rinsed in the cleaner water away from the banks. Neolithic finds have revealed the earliest occupation of the area, and the Romans have left their mark in the road through the town and evidence of villas. The Normans set up a shire moot, and religious organisations established an abbey at Boxley, hospitals and a college for priests. Today’s suburb of Penenden Heath was a place of execution in medieval times. Maidstone played a key role during the Peasants' Revolt of 1381. The rebel priest John Ball had been imprisoned there and was freed