Hobart Northern Suburbs Railway

22/10/2026

43% of passengers on Canberra's Light Rail had not previously used public transport. You'll be amazed to learn that Canberra ALREADY had buses!
In other words, if buses on their own were the answer to congestion, urban sprawl, inner-suburban higher-density residential development, moving large crowds for major events, faster peak travel times, and obviously attracting people to switch to public transport, then they would have done it by now. They haven't.
The State Government's Bus 'Rapid' Network business case matches this reality, with an atrocious Benefit-Cost-Ratio of just 0.28.

Sign the petition to keep rail if you haven't already (link in comments).

Image shows a Canberra Metro light rail vehicle leaving the current terminus at Alinga Place.

20/10/2026

Sign the petition!
Even Tasmania's bus drivers want rail!

There’s just one month left to sign our petition calling for light rail for Hobart’s future.

The Macquarie Point Stadium is moving ahead, but there's still no reliable transport plan to get people there.

The current government proposal relies on a bus network that's already stretched. Without high-capacity public transport, traffic congestion will only get worse.

But there’s a ready-made transport solution: the government-owned disused rail corridor that can be converted into light rail.

The benefits of light rail are too big to ignore. It will:
• Connect the northern suburbs to the city
• Reduce traffic congestion; and,
• Unlock more housing that Hobart desperately needs.

The decisions made today will shape Hobart for decades. If we don’t speak up now, we’ll miss the opportunity to build the transport system our city needs.

Sign and share the petition to kick-start light rail for Hobart’s future 👇👇👇

https://haepetitions.parliament.tas.gov.au/haepet/Home/PetitionDetails/150?title=Petition%20Details

13/10/2026

Admittedly its a very low bar, but the Australian Rail Speed Record is 210km/h. Its held by this train in the image, the Queensland Rail electric Tilt Train.
Why is that important?
Because it runs on the SAME rail gauge that we have in Tasmania! 1067mm (or 3 foot 6 inches in Imperial measurement).
Not only the fastest train in Australia runs on this gauge track, but so do massive coal trains hauling over 10,000t every day. So do commuter trains in Brisbane and Perth. As well as all over Japan, in South Africa and some other countries. At one point a few years ago a South African ore train had the world record for the world's longest and heaviest freight train ON THE SAME GAUGE.
What is the point of this? Quite obviously, there's NOTHING WRONG with the gauge we have. Keeping it and upgrading the track is the cheapest and best option we have. Ripping up those tracks for a wider gauge is completely unnecessary, and will cost more. The state government has deliberately not costed a commuter or light rail sevice using the existing gauge, in order to artificially increase the likely cost of rail, to justify their bus plan (which despite their efforts is still not viable).
RAIL or FAIL.

11/10/2026

Yes, that does look very 'Rapid', doesn't it?
🤔🙄
We might suggest it be renamed the Farce Bus Network!
(map from Building Tasmania's website)
The 'consultation' phase of the Northern Suburbs 'Rapid' Bus route has now closed but there's nothing stopping you contacting the Minister for Infrastructure, Kerry Vincent, and letting him know that you do not support this farcical plan.
AND you can still sign the petition! (link in comments)

10/10/2026

This is Bellevue Parade, New Town, at the intersection of Oldham Avenue.
Now, as you can see, it just so happens that Bellevue Pde dips a little at this point, and is roughly 2m lower than the railway line (and intercity cycleway).
Unfortunately for the planners at Building Tasmania, this is where they want the rail-destroying busway to come off the corridor, and turn up Oldham Ave. The railway is quite close to the road here as well, which means this whole area would need to be completely dug up and rebuilt to enable large articulated buses to make that turn.
How much? No idea. Several million just for this intersection. Maybe a lot more. That telegraph pole looks to be in exactly the wrong place...
How will they handle the intercity cycleway? How will they stop cars from just driving on to the busway and hooning along?
But if we kept rail, what would we have to do here? Almost nothing. A few new sleepers fitted to the tracks. A bit of extra ballast. Some of the actual rail may need replacing. No problem. Overhead wires fitted (unless we go battery all the way).
The more you consider the government's plan, the less sense it makes.
RAIL OR FAIL.

09/10/2026

This is Bay Road in New Town, at the intersection of the railway obviously, looking northwest (mostly west) towards the bridge and embankment over Risdon Road.
A glance tells you that this would need to be completely rebuilt, widened significantly and the bridge replaced if they want to fit two lanes of a busway PLUS the intercity cycle-way!
The intersection here is not really wide enough for two lanes coming through either. They might even have to remove this road crossing.
The cost of rebuilding & widening the embankment here will be enormous - by far the single largest cost of the whole busway plan.
But to keep rail? Hardly anything. The track needs to be fixed up a little here, more than in most places, but that is a simple engineering task that will cost A FRACTION, a tiny amount compared to the busway. We are literally talking maybe $2million for rail versus $200 million for the buses!
Feedback for the government's 'consultative' process finishes tonight, so please get on to their website, do the survey, and tell them you want rail services, not buses, along this line!
(link in comments)

08/10/2026

Unfortunately there are far too many candidates running for Hobart and Glenorchy councils for us to try and contact them all and ask them for their position on whether they support the Government's unviable unfunded & unwanted busway, or returning the railway to what it should be, a commuter service that generates jobs, housing and commercial development.
We welcome any of them if they want to comment their views below, of course, to help people make up their mind.

We have noted, however, that a number of candidates have known affiliations with the Liberal party, or have previously run in state elections as Liberal party candidates. Therefore we are quite confident these people will blithely support the state government's busway plan, that won't fix nor avoid congestion, and will cost more than rail!
They may wring their hands and gnash their teeth and claim that there's nothing that they can do, but in fact if both Hobart and Glenorchy council took careful note of the fact that the bus network farce (no, not fast) has a useless benefit-cost ratio of just 0.28, and they can and should collectively tell the state government that they support RAIL.

07/10/2026

Oldham Avenue — Just an ordinary (but rather nice) suburban street. A completely inappropriate route for a high-frequency bus service (using large buses too).

01/10/2026

FOUR TIMES MORE DEVELOPMENT WITH RAIL..in fact, the reports show that the amount of development that will likely happen with the busway is so poor, it's barely above what would happen if there was nothing done.
However, we cannot sit here and just hope that some development will somehow magically encourage the government to change its mind - because that doesn't happen. The commitment to rail needs to happen FIRST before any developers will get interested -and if the tracks are ripped up for a busway - the opportunity will be lost, and the amount of new housing development, will be far far less.
Billions of dollars wort of similar higher-density developments have been spent on the Gold Coast and in Canberra along the corridors after rail was introduced.
It won't happen with buses that are NOT going to be Rapid!

30/09/2026

I'll just leave this here.
RAIL or FAIL.