Bath and North East Somerset Council has approved the mixed-use scheme at the former factory site in Keynsham, which is expected to create 1,000 jobs during construction.

Taylor Wimpey’s Bristol office will oversea the construction of the homes in several multi-storey blocks and a sports and leisure club, primary school and healthcare centre.

The entire project is expected to take five years to complete.

The factory was closed in 2011 following US company Kraft’s acquisition of Cadbury in 2010. The company had pledged to keep the site opened but days after the completion of the deal Kraft announced it would close the plant and move production to Poland.

Consultant WSP has provided planning support including transport, roads and drainage design, as well as structural and building services for the new leisure centre.

WSP project manager Neil Brant said: “Somerdale has been a technically and politically challenging site from the outset requiring extensive input from WSP.

“There were multiple challenges to overcome, particularly meeting sustainability criteria at the same time as providing solutions that would meet the development’s needs.”

Adrian Slade from Taylor Wimpey said: “WSP has played an extremely important role in helping us gain planning approval for this ambitious project, coming up with solutions that expertly met all the competing priorities of the scheme and ensuring all the involved parties were confident of those solutions.”