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Transportation staffs from Fairfax and Loudoun counties are finalizing a plan for needed road connections and additional transit service around the planned Route 28 Metrorail station.

Several major development proposals exist for the area, including the massive 79-acre Dulles World Center plan, mainly in Loudoun, which could include more than 1 million square feet of office space and 1,500 homes and apartments, as well as stores and restaurants. Two proposals in Fairfax would also increase the development densities on parcels near the station.

Staffs from neighboring jurisdictions hope to create a joint plan by mid-2010 for road improvements and transit service to serve this redevelopment.

That elected officials are even talking to each other about the issue at this point "is encouraging," said Fairfax County Board of Supervisors Chairwoman Sharon Bulova (D-At-large).

Transportation and land use planning staff members from Fairfax and Loudoun counties and the Town of Herndon have had about 15 meetings this year to discuss the development proposals and how they might affect the road network.

The Route 28 station, which will be open to passengers by 2016, according to current timelines, will be built in the median of the Dulles Airport Access Road just east of Route 28. The station itself will be wholly within Fairfax, but will be close to Loudoun and Herndon.

While Fairfax is planning for pedestrian-friendly "transit-oriented development" in the area, new road connections are needed to ensure adequate bus service to the new rail station as well, according to Mike Garcia, a Fairfax transportation planner.

One of the upcoming decisions facing Fairfax officials is where they want passengers to enter and exit on the north side of the station.

Preliminary plans called for the station landings to be placed on county-owned land near the station, but county officials are considering asking the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority to place the entrances on the Center for Innovative Technology property. The CIT property, which now houses one office building, could be redeveloped at a higher density.

Complicating that decision, however, is the choice of where to place a planned overpass over the Dulles Toll Road, now planned to extend Rock Hill Road across to connect with Sunrise Valley Drive. This overpass could interfere with Fairfax's desired placement of rail station entrances, but an alternative suggestion of aligning the overpass to the west could affect a major development project Loudoun is considering, known as the Dulles World Center.

Transportation officials are working on traffic modeling and basic engineering reviews to determine the best route for the overpass and other roadways in both counties. The elected officials involved in the interjurisdictional discussions plan to meet again in February to try and reach some preliminary conclusions.

"I hope that in arriving at whatever decisions are arrived at ... we bear in mind that the impact is on all of us," Herndon Councilman William B. Tirrell Sr.