Dallas12 wrote:I’m just curious as to why it is not running below grade all the way through Victory? I would assume part of it is cost but did not know if there were other major factors. TIA for any insight.
It's a matter of geometry as much as anything else. The portal ramp down into the tunnel requires a certain amount of space, and due to the street arrangement, the only two places it could go are on either side of Woodall Rodgers. The spot on the north side has to hold the Museum station (and might be a bit short anyways, depending on what the minimum length is), and you can't put a station on a ramp, so it has to be on the south side.
In theory, they could lower the tracks just south of Victory station a bit such that a ramp west of Victory Ave could be possible, but it wouldn't really be worth it. It would require an extended shutdown of the Green and Orange lines through there (as it stands, they'll probably only need a few weekends at most to tie in the new tracks), and would just add further to the costs. As far as I know, there hasn't been any uproar about the tracks being at-grade through Victory Park; so why go through all the trouble for not much benefit.