ION - Waterloo Region's Light Rail Transit

[danbrotherston]

I daydream about this every time I ride through that section. What a wasted opportunity...

That would have been a bad route, IMO. Think of the work necessary to get accessible stairs and a ramp down to the bottom of the corridor for a station there. Also, the nearest track at the bottom is a bit more than 90m from the current station platform, straight line distance, so a switchback ramp and stairs at AODA maximum grade would potentially double that distance. That would add a couple minutes to get to the station for healthy people, more for people with mobility issues, and thus reduce the catchment area on the other side of Courtland Ave., not to mention how it makes transferring to and from busses less convenient, too.

And the station would have been closer to the buildings at Fallowfield, and Homer Watson.

As for "the work necessary"...this is the same work that's needed at every single grade separated station everywhere in the world.

I will be the first one to argue for ground level stations, they do provide better integration into the pedestrian realm, but in this instance, you're looking at a savings of 4-6 minutes travel time, plus a better street level realm (the current Courtland route is utter trash--partly because of the LRT routing), plus a trade off of better connections to some places, and worse connections to other places, seems like a very strong win.

Also, I question some of your numbers, the track in question is only 74 meters from the current station access (remember, street level design is trash), and the bridge pier is only 65 meters. And even if AODA ramps required a switchback (which they don't have, too, they could be accessed by elevator instead) most grade separated stations also have stairs which can be much shorter.  So you're really looking at a 65-70 meter further walk, plus stairs, and again, that's added to the Courtland side, but subtracted from the Fallowfield side.