Barns on a Herefordshire farm that previously housed egg-laying hens have been put to new uses – but not everyone is happy with the change.

David Orgee of Redcastle Farm, Bosbury near Ledbury applied in January to have the two buildings, together covering nearly 3,000 square metres, retrospectively reclassified as being for general industrial, storage and distribution use.

They have been divided into 15 individual units served by 17 new parking spaces, with no changes to their external appearance.

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According to a statement with the application, the farm “experienced severe difficulty in operating the free-range egg unit” but had since “identified a large demand for small commercial units for storage and general industrial units”.

The change to these uses has already taken place, with the storage units “predominantly” used to house cars, leading to a “similar” number of vehicle movements to and from the site as before, the statement said.

A subsequent letter from the farm’s agent confirmed last month that all units are already let, four in “workshop-type use”, the remaining 11 being for commercial and domestic storage.

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Neighbouring Bosbury and Coddington group parish council said that while it supported the application, it does “not like retrospective planning applications”.

Nearby resident Elizabeth Clutterbuck feared that the change in use “could generate substantially more traffic” than claimed in the accompanying statement, and that satnav had already brought a car transporter down the C-class road to her property in search of the farm units.

And Claire Warren said the disruption caused by the change of use, which now includes storage of racing cars, “isn’t acceptable”, with an increase in cars “using inappropriate speed”, and “toilet vans spilling a lot of very smelly disinfectant/contaminated water along the road”.

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Concerns raised by the council’s highways officer about parking and turning space and lack of cycle parking at the site were addressed in revisions to the application.

Planning officer Matthew Neilson concluded that with fewer lorry visits than under the previous use, “the over [sic] impact upon the local highways network is reduced”.

Conditions were imposed limiting visits to the units, and work within them, to between 8am and 6pm weekdays, until 1pm on Saturdays, and not at all on Sundays and holidays.