Starbucks has been given permission for a new drive-thru coffee shop at Greenbridge Retail Park.

But it will come at the cost of more than 60 parking spaces – which has caused some concern for Swindon Borough Council.

The council’s planners have given the green light for proposal put forward by the owners of Greenbridge retail and entertainment park M&G UK Property.

It will see a new coffee shop built on the southern portion of the retail park - accessed from Garrard Way off Drakes Way, facing the Gym Group building.

The application took pains to emphasise that a new Starbucks would not damage the town centre’s viability.

It said: “The proposed operations can only act as a complementary facility to existing and established large format commercial destinations, which in this case also includes the commercial areas to the south and east of the retail and leisure park, with the proposed development principally serving customers of the Park.

Access to the new café will be off Garrard Way on the edge of the park with the drive-thru lane looping around the single café building, and exiting out at the other side of the site.

There will also be 35 car parking spaces available for those who might want to sit in the shop with their drinks.

But the footprint of the new shop would take up what has been until now 61 of the retail park’s parking spaces.

That led the council’s highways officer to object to the plan initially. The applicant said there was enough parking elsewhere on the retail park.

While the highways officer is not entirely persuaded by that argument, they have dropped their objection.

Recommending approval of the plan, the planning case officer wrote: “The development does not represent a challenge or competition to defined town centre locations.

“The proposal essentially functions as a coffee shop serving users of the retail and Leisure park, in the same way that coffee shops in town centre act as a complementary function to the wider area

“The drive-thru itself would give rise to additional employment opportunities which attracts weight in favour of the proposal and would utilise previously developed land.”