View East Falls Church area plan in a larger map

Just a couple months after finishing the massive Crystal City Sector Plan, Arlington County is entering the last, intensive phase of another of its neighborhood planning efforts: East Falls Church.

The updated draft of that plan (all 122 pages of it) is now up on the county's website (h/t to WashCycle), and Arlington will host a community forum in February to get the public's input on the plan. The planning commission also has the draft [PDF] on its agenda next week.

Although some residents balked at the plan last year, the county is moving forward with its vision for the Metro station property and surrounding sites that has mixed-use buildings, some of them as tall as nine stories, residential development, an open plaza facing retail shops, and a reconfigured transit hub and bicycle lanes around the site.

Detractors have said they aren't excited about losing their Metro parking lot, or about urbanizing their largely suburban, single family neighborhood. The parking issue could get ugly, though, as VDOT isn't necessarily getting behind the idea of eliminating the 422-spot commuter parking spaces at the Metro station.

Keep an eye on the county's website for the date for the February public forum.