RESIDENTS living near a proposed 350-apartment development at the Tall Trees site near Yarm fear it will create a major traffic problem.

Owner Javed Majid has submitted an outline planning application to Stockton Council for the £80m development.

The plans include demolishing Club M nightclub and a leisure centre to make way for the two and three-bedroom apartments, with security systems, landscaped gardens, walkways, tennis courts, an underground car park and free bus service.

Mr Majid said: "This is going to be something fantastic. This will meet a need for top quality housing in the area and complement the ongoing development of Teesside."

However, one resident who lives nearby fears that the new apartments will create a serious traffic problem on the B1264.

Mrs Jeanette Horner said: "The amount of traffic this will create appals me.

"It's a very dangerous road, we have had three horrendous accidents recently and this could mean up to 700 more cars and that really alarms me."

Coun Marjorie Simpson, who represents Yarm on Stockton Council, said some people welcomed the development.

"Some people in the area I know will be pleased about this, because it could mean Club M is going.

"People feel it may mean the problems in the town centre with rowdies will be eased, because people won't come from miles around to go to the club. Whether that will affect the pub trade, I don't know.

"I know there are concerns about the traffic the development will create, because Yarm cannot take the number of cars, so if this development and another big development of flats in the town centre gets the go- ahead, the problem will be absolutely horrendous.

"The development has its pluses and minuses, there are lots of ways of looking at it.

"Traffic is always an issue, but if it goes ahead it will be a magnificent development, I don't think there is anything like it in the area."

Stephen Hesmondhalgh of Blackett Hart and Pratt solicitors, Mr Majid's agent, said the traffic issues had been looked at in great detail, and acknowledged that there would be an increase in traffic movements as a result of the development.

However, they had also looked at ways of reducing those movements, by providing business facilities, so residents would find it easy to work from home, or the business suite at the hotel, rather than driving to work.

Cycleways and pedestrian footpaths from the complex to the station and into Yarm, would be improved as part of the development to help encourage residents to leave their cars at home.

A chemist's shop, hairdressers and small grocery store would also be provided, as well as leisure facilities on site to reduce the number of trips into town, plus a free bus service to Yarm, Darlington, Stockton and Middlesbrough.

If the outline planning application submitted to Stockton Council is accepted, work is expected to take five years to complete and create thousands of construction jobs.

Under the plan, the hotel will be extended with 120 more rooms and a new reception area and will feature a wall of glass overlooking the woods that curve down to Saltersgill Beck.