A chapter of Tasmanian media history has closed, with 7 Tasmania News airing its final bulletin from its Watchorn Street studios in South Launceston tonight.
The station’s departure comes after more than 60 years at the location and just days after the announcement of Seven West Media’s acquisition of the channel.
The closure was prompted after the station was evicted by the building’s new owners, who purchased the facility from station owners Southern Cross Austereo in 2022 with plans to demolish and redevelop the asbestos-ridden structure.
News production will temporarily relocate to Hobart for several weeks while new studios are established at 183 Charles Street in Launceston’s CBD.
A temporary control room has been established at the station’s Hobart office, with the news to be both presented and controlled entirely from the state’s south for the first time in the station’s history.
“We, as always, are focusing on continuing to produce the best, most comprehensive and only 365 days a year Tasmanian TV news,” a 7 Tasmania spokesperson told Pulse.
The purpose-built Watchorn Street studio has been central to Tasmania’s media landscape since TNT9 commenced transmissions to north and north-west Tasmania in 1962.
Initially owned by W. R. Rolph and Sons, publishers of The Examiner, the station was Tasmania’s second commercial television broadcaster – behind TVT-6 in Hobart
Governor Lord Rowallan officially opened the station and its Watchorn Street facility on 26 May 1962, accompanied by station General Manager Arthur Evans and Edmund Rouse, the Managing Director of W. R. Rolph and Sons.
The station expanded its broadcast footprint statewide in 1994 during ‘aggregation’.
On March 14 2018, the station moved its Southern Cross News broadcasts from its original ‘warehouse style’ analog news studio to a new compact digital broadcast studio and control room in another part of the building at Watchorn Street.
The bulletin rebranded to 7 Tasmania Nightly News later that year.
Tonight, the Watchorn Street building has beamed into the homes of tens of thousands of Tasmanian homes for the last time, 23,001 nights after its 1962 screen debut.
While no formal announcement marked the final broadcast tonight, the bulletin closed with a brief aerial shot of the Watchorn Street studios in a subtle nod to the facility’s history.
The impending ownership change to Seven West Media in a $3.75 million deal has sparked concerns about potential job losses and mainland-centralisation.
Premier Jeremy Rockliff has expressed hope that Seven’s announced acquisition this month will strengthen the local media landscape.
“Local news plays such a key role in informing, advocating, and entertaining communities,” Rockliff told Pulse earlier this month.
A cross-party group of Tasmanian senators previously demanded assurances that local news operations remain in Tasmania following any sale, insisting the nightly news bulletin continue to be produced within Tasmanian studios.
Seven West Media is expected to finalise its acquisition of 7 Tasmania from Southern Cross Austereo by July.
