The contents box seems to cause endless problems with article layout, particularly when combined with an infobox[1], or when the intro section is short compared to the number of sections in the article.[2] The result always seems to be a huge white space between the intro and the rest of the article.
Would it be possible to have the contents box appear in the side panel of the GUI, perhaps above the toolbox? This could either be a per-article setting or perhaps site-wide.
Steve
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_elevator