Controversial plans to transform part of an Asda car park into a drive-thru – tipped to be KFC – have been approved.

Dartford Council's Development Control Board met last night and voted eight to four in favour of the scheme at the store in Crossways Boulevard, Greenhithe.

It means Euro Garages, which owns the superstore, has the green light to erect a takeaway business in the car park with dine-in capacity and a drive-thru.

While a previous application had been for a 24-hour drive-thru, the applicant has since agreed operating hours will be from 9am to 11.30pm.

The name of the proposed user has not been specified but KFC – whose nearest restaurant is 1.4 miles away at Bluewater – is tipped to be behind the bid.

Last year the development control board decided to defer the decision due to concerns over parking, traffic problems and the ongoing issues of so-called boy racers.

Speaking after last night's meeting, Cllr Katie Lynch, who represents Swanscombe and Greenhithe Resident’s Association, said approving the scheme had been "completely the wrong decision."

"It's detrimental to the community," she said. "The decision was deferred the first time to allow more studies to be done on the use of the car park, because we have concerns around capacity, and concerns that if that car park overflows onto the main road. We've had that happen a few times now without the drive-thru."

She said the parking study that went before the control board was "flawed", adding: "It was only based on one week of data. They claimed there were 80-100 spaces free every day, which is just fundamentally not true. What they're suggesting is that there's more than enough capacity, which is just not the case. They didn't take into consideration disabled spaces; there's a lot wrong with it."

Reports put before the control board stated the development would occupy a 1,790 sq.m section of the car park, comprising 40 car parking spaces, a hand car wash and recycling centre.

But Cllr Lynch noted a further 10 spaces would be lost, due to the relocation of the car wash.

"I think it will exacerbate the lack of parking," added Cllr Lynch. "There's also the potential for more anti social behaviour."

And while she said boy-racers had been less of an issue recently, she added: "This is just providing a pit stop for them."

"We just don't need it," she said. "There's lots of other venues in the vicinity."

She said there were a raft of problems with the scheme – stating it provided no dedicated parking spaces for restaurant users, included no assessment for future growth, and that no work had been done to assess the "huge potential of traffic conflicts" caused by increased traffic movement.

Furthermore she said no work had been done to assess the impact of queues, or to reassess the need for electric vehicle spaces.