Fix heritage rail insurance hurdles and reap the benefits
Government should redeem its apathy and fall in line with other states, says John Livermore
ANY organisation wishing to operate a railway on Crown land or the TasRail network under present requirements of the Tasmanian government has to hold public liability insurance of at least $200m.
This is imposed on all heritage rail bodies including the Tasmanian Transport Museum in Glenorchy and the Derwent Valley Railway.
Owen Andrews has highlighted this cost, about $80,000 a year for any heritage rail organisation, as prohibitively expensive and blocking all developments in the heritage rail sector (Talking Point, September 5).
He also noted that in every other state and territory, governments have developed arrangements to allow this cost to be shared and not put on the shoulders of individual operators. The average public liability cost interstate come out not as $200m but as $20m a year. In Victoria, risk of more than $20m is covered by a publicly funded insurance scheme for transport operators. Derwent Valley Railway has held safety accreditation since 1994 when it was formed. The DVR and lines such as Launceston and Northern Line Railway and the Wiltshire Line and former Emu Bay line are part of the Tasmanian Rail Network, leased to TasRail by the Crown which then can lease to an organisation such as a heritage rail provider.
The advice from TasRail is that Derwent Valley Railway is considering applying to state government for access to the non-operational line under the Infrastructure Corridors (Strategic and Recreational Use) Act 2016 rather than the Network Access Agreement with TasRail. The Act provides a non-operational rail corridor being banked for future strategic use, but in the meantime an application can be made by a party such as Derwent Valley Railway to state government through the Department of State Growth for access for an eligible activity. Approval for rail or other recreational use is at the discretion of state government and parliament under the Act’s provisions. This would not be a decision for TasRail and if a non-operational line was declared a Strategic
Infrastructure Corridor under the Act, it would transfer back to the Crown.
In a debate on the Strategic Infrastructure Corridors (Strategic and Recreation Use) Bill 2016 in the Legislative Council, MLC Craig Farrell noted the Derwent Valley line was restored before the withdrawal of Pacific National in 2004 as a rail operator, with track rebuilding by volunteers to enable tourist trains to run from New Norfolk to Mt Field National Park. Access fees were paid and annual liability insurance from 2002-2004 were covered by fares with one
of the Walk to Wilderness trains carrying 300 cruise ship passengers from Hobart. Mr Farrell cited a 2010 Victoria Tourism estimate of a single rail operator’s contribution to the economy as $49m a year. This he viewed as indicating heritage rail as an important earner for Tasmania’s tourism.
An amendment was passed by the Legislative Council to ensure the infrastructure minister would not have sole power to determine variation in any railway network line but for parliament to have the final say. This amendment was passed by the House of
Assembly as part of the Strategic Infrastructure Corridors (Strategic and Recreational Use) Act 2016.
In September, the extension to the North East Rail Trail was set to go ahead with $1.47m in federal funding. The Launceston and North Eastern Railway was closed by Pacific National in 2004 as being non-commercial on the main basis of upgrading of roads in the North-East to accommodate B-double trucks and the line was also closed to heritage rail. The line had been completely rebuilt in 1994 with heavy duty rails.
In September, Dorset Council was given control by the state government of a rail section from Rocherlea to Scottsdale. A 47km section of the line estimated at $40m worth of infrastructure was taken up by a tenderer.
This was severely criticised by the Launceston and North Eastern Railway heritage group which had plans to run tourism trains from Launceston to Scottsdale. In a post on the group’s Facebook page, a member described the destruction of a heritage railway as “an act of state sanctioned vandalism”.
Minister Ferguson needs to redeem the state government’s apparent indifference, even hindrance, to the development of a vibrant rail tourism heritage to match the proven benefits from other states and New Zealand, let alone the earlier promise of services run by the Derwent Valley Railway.