Plans for 25 bungalows for over 55s in a village near Lancaster have been given the go-ahead.
The new housing in fields near Hawthorn Avenue at Brookhouse was granted planning permission on Monday.
Residents spoke out against the proposals at a meeting held at Morecambe Town Hall, worried that the development could cause flooding and extra traffic, and said they felt there was unsuitable access to the land, and the scheme would cause potential damage to the environment.
But council officers recommended the scheme should be approved due to a housing shortfall in the Lancaster district.
"Whilst there are adverse impacts arising from the development, and a small degree of conflict with some policies within the Development Plan, these impacts are not considered to significantly and demonstrably outweigh the benefits of the proposal, namely, housing," said a council report.
Most councillors on the Lancaster City Council planning regulatory committee agreed.
Eight of the committee members - Councillors Cleet, King, Lenox, Knight, Thomas, Hartley, Tyldesley and Guilding - voted in favour of the scheme.
Councillors Redfern, Brookes, Hamilton-Cox and Budden abstained.
Councillor Tim Hamilton-Cox, of the Greens, said: "We should be looking at other land that is available and directing development to there.
"This is not what we would want to approve in usual circumstances."
But Councillor Colin Hartley, of Labour, said: "All the best sites have gone and have been built on.
"All planning applications have problems with them. We do desperately need houses for more mature members of the population."
The application by Applethwaite Homes was given the go-ahead subject to several conditions.
You can read the full planning report here.
The land is situated in the Forest of Bowland Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) but councillors were told there had been no comments received from the AONB Partnership.
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