NEW CITY

Cable car plans finally lodged with council

CABLE car access to the top of kunanyi/Mt Wellington is now the closest it’s ever been to reality, with the first development application lodged.

Mount Wellington Cableway Company chair Chris Oldfield yesterday afternoon submitted the plans to the Hobart City Council.

It means the council could be voting on whether to approve a cable car as early as August.

The controversial drilling was not required to complete the development application at this stage, the company said, but would be needed before construction began.

Mr Oldfield said it was a “historic moment” to finally lodge the plans after more than 100 years of speculation since the idea was first proposed in 1905.

He said the $54 million project would take an estimated 180,000 cars off Pinnacle Rd each year and create 200 jobs during construction and 80 ongoing positions.

Mr Oldfield said the company hadn’t raised all the finance but he was confident it could reach $54 million, and hoped it would come from mostly Tasmanian backers.

The cable car would take between 12 and 18 months to build once fully approved.

Mr Oldfield said a key feature of the project was there would be no “scar” on the mountain, with the cars to sit about 10m above the tree line.

He said some trees would have to be felled around the proposed base station off McRobies Rd in South Hobart, and the visual impact from Hobart CBD would be minimised with the pinnacle structure to sit below the ridge line.

“We are confident it meets all the criteria for an environmentally and economically sustainable cable car,” Mr Oldfield said.

“We love the mountain and are proud of this project so we want everyone to be able to read what we are proposing and to decide for themselves.”

He said the company planned to release the full 804page submission, including all reports and supporting documentation, publicly in coming days. If approved, the company said the cable car would provide a $64 million benefit to the Tasmanian economy that would rise to almost $100 million a year once operational.

Residents Opposed to the Cable Car spokesman Ted Cutlan said they welcomed the application to a “certain extent” but it would be the “death of the project”.

“What they’ve put forward on their website has so many hurdles to jump, it can’t possibly conform to the Wellington Park management plan for the mountain,” he said.

Mr Cutlan said opponents would fight the development all the way to the planning appeal tribunal if needed. The State Government, a strong supporter of the project, welcomed the announcement.

“We have always said the project must obtain all of the necessary approvals, including those that protect Tasmania’s natural environment,” Treasurer Peter Gutwein said.

“The Government now looks forward to it being assessed under the normal planning process, which provides opportunities for public comment and review informed by the specifics of the development application.”