The road is well known for Blue Bell Hill, which connects Rochester to Maidstone through the North Downs, and links the M2 and M20 motorways.

The A229 through Maidstone is a major bottleneck on the route, with long daily morning and evening queues entering both sides of the town.

[2] In 2006, the road was set up with the then largest vehicle checkpoint campaign in Kent, in order to catch drug dealers and benefit fraudsters.

[7] On 19 November 1965, three women were severely injured in a road accident at Blue Bell Hill on the A229 when their Ford Cortina collided with a Jaguar.

The basic story is that a driver passing the Lower Bell pub on the A229 spots a lone female dressed in white at the side of the road.

Other variations of the story report a small purse or handbag left behind, or that when the driver reaches the intended address, he is informed by a family member there that his passenger died several years previously.

[11][12] On 13 July 1974, local bricklayer Maurice Goodenough ran into Rochester Police Station and reported he had run over a girl aged around 10 on Blue Bell Hill, who suffered several cuts, and had left her at the roadside wrapped in a blanket.