A new Aldi will be coming to the county town despite planning permission being refused by a local authority.

Maidstone council rejected plans for the store at Newnham Court Way in August last year but this week its decision was overturned by government planning inspector Matthew Shrigley on appeal.

The new shop will be built on a green open space which the council had designated as long ago as 2017 as part of a medical campus with the aim of attracting “high value, knowledge-intensive employment”.

Seven years later, the inspector was inclined to give more weight to the 45 jobs Aldi promised to create rather than wait longer for a hi-tech medical application to materialise.

Although the site is home to the KIMs Hospital, the Maidstone Innovation Centre and the Cygnet Hospital, other uses had also been permitted such as the Invicta Care Home.

The store will have 1,315 sq m of floorspace, plus an ancillary warehouse, freezer store and loading bay. There will be 140 customer parking spaces.

The site falls within the parish of Boxley, and both Boxley and Detling parish councils objected, principally because of the expected congestion that would result along Bearsted Road and New Cut Way.

The inspector said he could only refuse permission on highway grounds if the resulting congestion was likely to be “severe”.

But he noted that Kent County Council had been granted £4 million by the Department for Transport for the widening and signalisation of the roundabouts at the A249/Bearsted Road junction and the New Cut Road/Bearsted Road junction, which would, he said, “result in substantial capacity upgrades resolving local traffic movement issues”.

The inspector was impressed with the “generous” landscaping proposed by Aldi which would go a long way towards maintaining a parkland character.

However, the applicants could not meet the requirement for a 10% biodiversity net gain, so they would make this up by purchasing credits at an off-site “environmental bank”.

Mr Shrigley said he had considered the fears raised by opponents of the scheme that included pollution run-off to the River Len, noise, littering, harm to wildlife, the effect on the Kent Downs Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and a lack of SuDS drainage provision in the scheme.

But he concluded: “None of those points constitute convincingly sufficient reasons for refusal.”

The application requires Aldi to make a number of mitigation payments, including £100,0000 towards bus infrastructure provision.

Granting permission, Mr Shrigley said: “The overall benefits of the proposal outweigh the notional reduction in medical office space that might be achieved.”

His decision has been harshly criticised by Cllr Tony Harwood (Lib Dem), who said: “I have always opposed any development on the greenfield land at Newnham Court Farm that frames the attractive landscape setting of north Maidstone.

“It now seems an out-of-town business park is the destiny for this still attractive part of the county town.

“We can now expect further retail applications in the so-called medical campus in this sensitive foreground of the Kent Downs National Landscape.”

But the inspector’s decision may well be welcomed by Maidstone residents more generally.

During the application process, there were 174 letters supporting the plan and only 65 opposed.

Cllr Stan Forecast was also pleased to see the permission granted.

He said: “This site has been waiting seven years, in vain, for alternative commercial use.”

“With Labours sledgehammer approach to planning, I am pleased to see a new Aldi has been approved, rather than potential housing. At least it will, creating jobs and boosting the local economy.

“That said, I understand my colleagues’ concerns about congestion here and it is pivotal that KCC delivers on their promises for improvements here.”

Find out about planning applications that affect you at the Public Notice Portal.

The application was first submitted in November 2022.

Details can be seen on the Maidstone council website under application number 22/505560.