A public inquiry into plans to build 109 homes in a village has heard it "simply can't take any more building."

Gleeson Land submitted the proposal for Harrietsham to Maidstone council in March last year, but it was refused in June on the grounds that the site lay outside the limits to built development and was therefore in the countryside.

The borough said there was no justification for building in the countryside when it already had housing allocations that would provide for a five-year housing supply.

It also said the applicant had proposed inadequate landscaping and had failed to show there would be adverse effects on the highway.

The 5.15-hectare site – between Ashford Road, the A20, in the north and the Maidstone East railway line – already contains two bungalows, Firswood Lodge and Jays View. It lies within the setting of the North Downs AONB.

The issue is likely to revolve crucially on whether the inspector accepts that the borough still has a five-year housing supply.

Its Local Plan Review suffered a setback earlier this year. Having reached the final stage of a public hearing, the planning inspector then suspended the inquiry for several weeks after the borough submitted a raft of new documents.

Although the hearings did resume, the delay meant that the planning inspector has yet to give an opinion on whether he thinks the borough's draft plan is sound and can go forward to a more detailed examination.

At the appeal over the Harrietsham proposal, held in the Town Hall last week, planning inspector Rachel Pipkin heard from John Litton, the King's Counsel representing Gleeson, that the site was "only 130 metres" outside the limit to built development.

He contested the borough's claim that it had between 5.1 and 5.7 years of housing supply, saying the figure was actually 3.27 years.

The difference was partly explained because the council was using a housing requirement of 883 homes each year, as set out in the adopted Local Plan, whereas the Local Plan review calls for 1,157 homes a year.

However, the council's barrister, Mathew Henderson, said that the borough was having no issue meeting its housing targets.

In the first five years of the plan, it had exceeded them by 3,202 homes and it had failed to meet even the higher building figure in only one of the past five years.

He described the appellant's case as "an arid argument."

Eddie Powell, the chairman of Harrietsham Parish Council, was one of several local people also allowed to speak at the hearing.

He said the issue was not one of housing supply, target figures or policies. He said: "It is much simpler. We simply can't take any more building – our infrastructure is already reeling."

Although both sides referred to Harrietsham as a "rural service centre" with a range of facilities, he said: "In fact the doctors' surgery has been closed for three years and people have to take the bus to Lenham.

"The school has also been full for years with Harrietsham children being shipped out to schools across the borough."

The planning inspector's decision is not expected until the New Year.