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A house of worship that has been proposed in a residential area of Boyds is drawing concerns from neighbors in the rural community.

Though the project, a Zoroastrian house of worship, is in its preliminary stages, neighbors say they are wondering what effect a religious center will have on the street.

Preliminary site plans drafted by Raztec Associates + Engineers depict a 200-seat facility with 58 parking spots at 15316 Barnesville Road, just north of Clarksburg Road. The applicant's daughter, Shahin Kamran of Bethesda, said the proposed center is more likely to have between 100-150 seats, though nothing has been finalized. The center would be served by an on-site septic system and well.

Some neighbors received notification of the project from the engineering firm, but the plans have not been submitted to the Montgomery County Planning Board, she said. The project is contingent on permitting approvals and raising enough money for the facility, she said.

Zoroastrianism, one of the oldest religions in the world, was once the state religion of the Persian empire but has since seen its numbers drastically decline, according to the University of Pennsylvania's Web site. Many were forced to convert after ancient Iran was conquered by Muslim Arabs in the seventh century, according to the site, and Zoroastrians do not proselytize.

It is estimated that there are less than 200,000 Zoroastrians worldwide, mostly in India and Iran, and about 3,000 in North America, according to Santa Clara University's Web site.

"We were a faith of Persian antiquity. Good thoughts, good words, good deeds, always living in harmony with other religions," Kamran said. "It's a religion that's kind of dwindling and becoming extinct."

The Kamran Foundation is named as the applicant on the plans, but several other donors are involved through the nonprofit Zoroastrian Association of Metropolitan Washington Inc., Kamran said. According to state property records, the 5-acre site — composed of two adjacent parcels — was purchased in April by Khodamorad Kamran for $880,000. Khodamorad Kamran's Potomac address is listed on the plans as the address for the Kamran Foundation.

Khodamorad Kamran did not return call for comment.

At a Boyds Civic Association meeting earlier this month, some residents said they were concerned about the size of the proposed religious center, the potential for increased traffic on the two-lane road and that the center could place a large burden on the area's water resources.

Arthur Virts, who has lived across the street from the property for 50 years, said he had questions about how often the center would be used.

"This is a heavily traveled road — it's a commuter road. If [Interstate] 270 has a problem, they all come through here," Virts said last week. "…It's a problem we don't need in a residential district."

The local Zoroastrian community is small, Shahin Kamran said, and the center would likely be used for services once every few months during seasonal holidays and for occasional classes. There are no Zoroastrian houses of worship in the Washington, D.C., area, she said.