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5 ^ This project will connect a large concentration of apartment buildings to a neighborhood park. • This project will provide access to residents of a senior citizen condominium to a nature area with a firm and stable path that has a gentle grade. ^ This trail is routed through high quality remnants of oak savanna. ^ The trail is currently a dirt path that is eroding. It becomes unusable after heavy rains and during the winter. Public Need and Benefit of Project ^ The location of this trail is a natural route for hundreds of students who use it daily to walk from Lauderdale to the farm campus of the University of Minnesota. The narrow isolated path has been the site of various forms of sex crimes. Improving the trail would allow police squads to drive through and create a safer pedestrian route for the many students who use this trail. ^ Population within one mile: 10,000 people living in the cities of Lauderdale, St. Paul, Roseville, Falcon Heights, and Minneapolis. The west end of the proposed trail has a-very high density of apartments and town homes which lack a year round pedestrian access to the neighborhood park on the east end of the proposed trail Applicant Capability ^ Falcon Heights has completed the addition of eight miles of public paths in the last five years. Maintenance of these new paths has been integrated into our capital improvement plan. The city has completed infrastructure improvements totaling 5 million dollars since 1998. ^ Five-year plan for maintenance: This trail will be added to the Falcon Heights sidewalk inspection and repair program. Each year all public paths are inspected and given a rating based on trip hazards. Currently this program has a budget of $10,000 per year for repairs and replacement. If this trail is built it will part of our path-plowing route. The city routinely plows ten miles of public paths when a-two-inch snow thresh-hold has been reached. This service is funded by the- public works street maintenance budget. The addition of 1300 feet to our plow route is estimated to cost an additional $180.00 per year based on ten minutes of plowing per two inch snowfall. Community Commitment to Trail Use In 1989 Falcon Heights commissioned the firm of Barton/Aschman to develop a park master plan. This plan identified key pedestrian routes that should be developed. Since 1989 the city has added public paths along the majority of these routes. Paths have been added to Larpenteur Ave, Cleveland Ave., Roselawn Ave. and Hamtine Ave. This project would complete one of the last pieces identified in our 1989 park master plan as desirable for a walking trail. A survey of recreation preferences was taken while preparing the park master plan •