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The past several weeks have been fraught with heavy emotion as Ramsey County prepares to reconstruct Cleveland Avenue into a modern transportation corridor that meets the safety and access needs of our multimodal community ("Press pause on clear-cutting Cleveland Avenue," Opinion Exchange, June 9). Completing this project sadly requires us to remove more than 150 trees from Cleveland Avenue — many of which are mature, beautiful trees that have provided joy and comfort to residents for decades.

I understand the sadness felt by neighbors over the loss of these trees, and I can assure you that I share the disappointment over losing any mature tree as we battle climate change and strive to preserve the green space so many of us rely on for our health and well-being.

At the same time, I'm deeply excited for the future of Cleveland Avenue once construction is complete. Cleveland Avenue as we see it today was originally built in 1948. From an infrastructure standpoint, the road is long past its usable life. Pavement is crumbling. Water and sewer lines that run underneath the road are outdated — some are more than 100 years old. There is no significant stormwater structure to manage the annual snowmelt and heavy spring storms.

And from a design standpoint, the layout no longer meets the broad needs of our multimodal community. Instead of the present-day two-lane road with parking, the new design will feature two traffic lanes, on-street bike lanes in each direction and a multiuse off-street trail and sidewalk. It also will include 70 new trees along with shrubs and perennials as part of stormwater treatment areas.

When we complete urban design projects, we have to take into account the interests of a broad range of community members and user groups. This often requires balancing competing visions for a space and how to create an inclusive design while minimizing environmental impacts.

The Cleveland Avenue engagement and design process was a prime example of this balancing act. Our project team collected valuable input from several groups of diverse stakeholders during nine engagement events over the course of the two-year planning phase. We heard multiple ideas and sometimes competing priorities from those who live on the corridor and across the community based on past, present and future corridor use. Guided by Ramsey County's All-Abilities Transportation Network plan, we then developed a vision that prioritizes the safety of our most vulnerable users — pedestrians and bicyclists — as they travel around the neighborhood, attend classes at the University of Minnesota or commute to work.

Over the past several weeks, I've had numerous technical conversations with engineers, planners and environmental experts, as well as discussions with residents in favor and against the new design. After all this, I'm confident that even if we were to halt construction to go through another engagement and design process, we would end up back at the same design because it's the right one that will serve community members utilizing Cleveland Avenue for decades to come. Plus, the road and its underlying infrastructure are in dire need of replacing now.

We did not take the impact to trees lightly. A cross-jurisdictional team of road and utility engineers, arborists and foresters evaluated — and reevaluated — each and every tree individually. They carefully weighed the impact to a tree's root structure and stability based on the location of utility lines, trail, sidewalk and the road itself.

As a policymaker, it's my job to balance the emotional and technical sides of projects, weigh decisions and trust the professionals. Based on all the information from our engineers and arborists, I know the experts made the right decisions here, as painful as it is to see the impact to the trees.

The past two years have been deeply emotional. We're still struggling with a deep sense of loss and a lack of full control over life. Losing a portion of the beautiful trees that have graced Cleveland Avenue since it was last constructed nearly 75 years ago — or longer — is not easy. But at the end of the day, I know it's the right decision to fix the critical infrastructure issues; build a better, safer multimodal transportation corridor, and allow for a more sustainable long-term environmental design.

Trista MatasCastillo is a member of the Ramsey County Board, representing the Third District.