ION - Waterloo Region's Light Rail Transit

[bravado]

My point is, you said they put the tracks in the middle except where they can’t; but really they put the tracks in the middle precisely when there are two tracks together, on-street, with the one exception for those 2 short blocks. I haven’t seen any evidence that it has anything to do with what is “possible”.

(the other exception one might think of is the stop at King & Victoria, but there you see one track on each side of the street, continuing the rule that lone tracks are at the curb and a pair of tracks are in the middle)

Ah okay, I see what you mean now.

I dug out a copy of the printouts of the Cambridge line that RoW provided to me. Looks like the entire route is double track and doesn't split off at any point which is good for snow removal...though the part where it runs through a roundabout will be unusual to clear. I wonder how it'll be able to handle the gradient changes around the Grand River Valley. If you/aneone rides it between Mill and Block Line, I'm sure you can hear when the train loses grip, slows down, sprays a ton of sand and then speeds up again (seemingly in any weather, but particularly worse in the spring/autumn/winter). That incline is not that steep.

Also, maybe I have an older copy of the plans but I thought this ran through a roundabout which would make snow removal harder. I don't see any roundabouts in my documents.

Stage 2 ION is supposed to go right through the roundabout at Beverly and Dundas that hasn't been built yet. This is the text version of their plans from a public consultation:

"When an ION vehicle approaches the roundabout, gates, bells and flashing lights will activate on the entry lanes to temporarily prevent vehicles from entering the roundabout until the train passes through. Exit lanes will remain open to allow any vehicles currently in the roundabout to exit safely before the train enters the intersection. The time required to complete this operation is minimal and is not anticipated to significantly impact traffic operations."

There is a photo of the route through the Beverly roundabout on Slide H:
http://rapidtransit.regionofwaterloo.ca/...Design.pdf