ION - Waterloo Region's Light Rail Transit

[Pheidippides]

I had a good look at all the curb work, sidewalk pouring, and paving through the public square station and the parking lot between caroline and king. It really highlighted for me how silly the regulations for warning lights/arms/signage are. You can lierally walk across the tracks almost anywhere in that stretch, but put a formal curb cut in and suddenly you need a physical barrier/lights/bells etc. all of which can be completely by-passed with a few steps to the right or left. I can almost guarantee that the lights and bells will be top complaint once the system is up and running.

It reminds me of the whole ISO certification craze of a decade or two ago. You could have a completely useless product/process, let's say to make a concrete life jacket, but as long as the process was documented and followed you were compliant. No one ever stops to think or challenge the assumptions of whether these procedures are actually helping/useful or are we just following instructions (rules) because the are written down and we need to check off a box to say that its done.

With all the recent investment and proposed investment in public rail projects are there any plans or advocay to modernize the regulations? Visitors from outside of Canada with LRT in their communities will probably have a good laugh upon experiencing our system's protections.