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Location of breadcrum trail on a web page, top, bottom, or somewhere in-between?

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From: Birkir R. Gunnarsson
Date: Aug 10, 2011 7:15PM

Hello wise ones.

I am doing an accessibility evaluation of a web page.
It has a breadcrum trail on every page (you are here ... main page --
next page -- etc) (where -- represents a new line character).
This is standard, and I haveno problem with it, per se, though
personally I never use them, notunless page titles are extremely
nclear.
The location of this breadcrum trail here is the second to last item
on the page (after about 5 or 6 different tabs). This is consistent
throughout the subpages of the site.
I am wondering, are there best practice guidelines or practical ideas
about whether this is good or not.
My gut instinct, at least, is to think that this trail should be close
to the top, rather than the bottom. For one thing the user will know
it's there (this is a fairly large page, so users may have given up
looking for it if they rae confused), and secondly, if this is the
wrong page, the user needs to be made aware of the fact before he/she
reads through all the content on the page.
Any ideas/counter arguments?
Cheers
-B