Plans to expand a busy multi-storey car park in Amersham to more than 1,000 spaces have been given the green light.

The 680-space car park in King George V Road will be extended by another 502 spaces after a capacity survey carried out by the council in June last year showed the car park was at full capacity three days a week, with growing demand mainly from commuters travelling into London.

It will be extended on to the council’s own land and will also include a further 30 disabled spaces.

Council bosses said the expansion will increase long-stay parking use at the multi-storey car park, freeing up more short-stay spaces in the Sycamore Road car park closer to the town centre, which could be a “potential boost” for businesses.

However the initial application received multiple objections, with one resident saying the building would look “out of place” compared to the rest of the town’s aesthetics, urging the council to get the “design of the building and landscaping right”.

The Amersham and District Residents Association also commented on the new building’s design, saying the prefabricated structure of the building with perforated metal mesh cladding would not match the brickwork and steel blade cladding of the existing building.

Taking this into account, the council was asked to submit samples or name types of external materials to the local planning authority before any construction work started, to “ensure that the external appearance of the development is not detrimental to the character of the locality”.