Plans for up to 600 new homes at Bapchild have been approved in principle – despite question marks over whether the road network will be able to cope.

GH Dean and Co has applied for permission to build on farmland off The Street at Stones Farm.

Despite a campaign by villagers, the land was earmarked for housing by Swale council in its 2008 planning blueprint for the borough.

On Thursday, members of the council’s planning committee granted approval – even though Kent County Council’s highways department had objected.

Kent Highways said the issue was with the Swanstree Avenue and Canterbury Road junction, where changes had reduced the amount of traffic it could cope with.

A spokesman said: “The Swanstree junction was reconfigured in direct response to highway safety concerns and as a result of a cluster of crashes, as a primary responsibility of KCC to address.

“We therefore are placing a holding objection on this application until such time as further capacity assessments have been submitted and approved.”

Traffic studies carried out on behalf of GH Dean had originally shown the junction could handle extra vehicles.

However, Kent Highways argued the findings were out of date because they were compiled before the Swanstree junction was changed.

The council’s area planning officer, Graham Thomas, said the matter was a technical issue and recommended the committee agreed the plans, subject to the junction issue being resolved.

Cllr Monique Bonney (Ind) urged the committee to make sure a solution was found to the traffic problem.

She said: “I think this is a huge scheme and, with the tailbacks we currently see along the A2, there will be significant impact on the A2, for all who use it.”

She also questioned the estate’s design, warning that lessons should have been learned from mistakes made at Eden Village with parking, too many wheelie bins outside homes and garages that were not connected to properties.

Cllr Bonney was also concerned about whether there were enough health facilities for new households and whether the developer was being asked to contribute enough towards school places.

Planning consultant Paul Sharpe, speaking on behalf of GH Dean, said a key part of the proposal was a 37-acre countryside gap, also accessible to residents of the Lansdowne estate.

Existing parking problems in Gladstone Drive, near the school, he added, could be solved by a new drop-off area in the school grounds, accessed via Stones Farm.