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E.g., Marshal! Hearing supra, at 16; St. Cloud Hearing supra, at 44, 53. Conversely, Interstate 90 makes a district along the state's southern border the most convenient option. Third, of the new first, seventh, and eighth congressional districts, only the eighth district has any population from counties that are part of the metropolitan statistical area. This population resides in Isanti and Chisago Counties, which include only 12% of the district's population, are not part of the original seven-county metropolitan area, were part of the prior eighth district, and have common interests with counties to the west and north. This configuration of districts, then, best reflects the citizens of Minnesota living outside the metropolitan area. IE. The counterpart to three largely rural districts is an urban, suburban, and exurban core of five districts. The Zachman plaintiffs have maintained throughout these proceedings that the nucleus of any congressional plan should be a single urban district containing most of Minneapolis and St. Paul, the state's most populous cities. we decline to adopt this suggestion for a number of reasons. Minneapolis and St. Paul have been in separate districts since 1891. Even now, as the cities' combined population nears that of one complete district, it would be necessary to split a substantial piece of one of the cities into a separate district in order to approximate, let alone achieve, the ideal population in the single urban district. According to current and former mayors of both cities and resolutions passed by the cities themselves, this is neither desirable nor practical. Hearing Before Minn. Spec. Redistricting Panel 39,41, 88,91 (St. Paul, Minn. Feb. 6, Z The combined population of Minneapolis and St. Paul is 669,769 people. Given this number, 54,834 people must be split from either Minneapolis or St. Paul and placed with a neighboring district to achieve the ideal district population of 614,935 people. ..7-