Lightroom: Crop options for Image Export tool would be great

Beyond that, what if the change of AR is to an already-cropped image? Currently, LR resets the crop before altering the AR. Is that okay? Should center be maintained? Edge? What if the crop has to be shrunk to fit in the current image?

To be clear, I was referring to an export crop only.

The addition that I was thinking of was an extra UI elements below the "Image Sizing" section of the Export popup to (optionally) manage cropping of the exported image. Because this would be embedded in an Export preset, there wouldn't be any additional steps after configuration. This would not change the original image in any way, but simply crop the exported image, much in the same way that the exported image can be resized, have its A-R changed, be post-processed, sharpened, have meta-data stripped, etc. etc. without affecting the original image.

To answer Lee Jay's comments, this would already take into account the processed image, much in the same way that any extra Export processing occurs on the developed image. As such, there would be no reset of the crop specified when developing the image. As far as cropping bias and resizing, the 9-panel UI in PS would be fine, or even center-bias. Dimensioning would be taken care of in a similar fashion as the image resizing options, which allow for quite a bit of flexibility.

I primarily see the use for this as exporting small print JPGs (e.g. 4x6s) from RAW files where the original image dimensions are close to, but not exactly, the size of the print. The workflow I'm talking about isn't really dealing with images that require drastic cropping from the original capture.

That's exactly what I've done for this. I've literally done hundreds in a few seconds.

I've clarified my thoughts in a response to your earlier comment, but to show you the difference between workflows:

Your suggested workflow:

1. Select images.
2. Crop in QD. Incidentally this will overwrite any existing crops that you have, and I'm not sure how this works with images of differing orientations.
3. Export w/resize options.
4. Undo crop.

My suggested workflow:

1. Select images.
2. Export w/resize and crop options.

While you do give up some control, it's a faster workflow. I acknowledge the control/speed tradeoff, and it's an choice that I wish I had in LR.

It would be a useful godsend for those who need it, and of no use to others, who are more than welcome to ignore the feature like the many others they never need.