Labor MP Shane Broad has come out in support of building a cable car on Kunanyi/Mt Wellington, saying it could become one of Hobart’s top three tourist attractions if done the right way.
Despite being a member for the electorate of Braddon on the other side of the state, Broad took to social media yesterday ahead of parliament returning today to voice his support.
Broad said a cable car would sit alongside Mona and Salamanca Market as a must-do for visitors to the city.
“I think if there was a cable car up Mount Wellington, we could actually do one that was sympathetic and wasn’t really poking people in the eye,” he said.
“When people come to Hobart, I reckon they’d do three things.”
“Go see Mona, Salamanca Market and go to the top of the mountain on a cable car, especially when there is snow.”
He said snow events currently make it nearly impossible to reach the summit because the road is closed, a problem a cable car would eliminate.
“With a cable car, you wouldn’t have that problem,” Broad said.
“It would be a major tourist attraction, but I think there has to be a way of doing it that means that it doesn’t stick out like a sore thumb.”
Responding to the Labor MP’s show of support, the Mount Wellington Cable Car company said the organisation was ready.
“We invested 10 years and millions of our own money into research, design and feasibility to achieve a sympathetic design that gets the balance right,” they said.
Broad’s comments come as the state government prepares to release its final action plan for the mountain, following a review that drew more than 9,000 responses.
Business, Industry and Resources Minister Felix Ellis said transport options for the mountain are “not up to standard for such an important natural asset.”
“Our Action Plan for the mountain is in final stages of development and will be released shortly,” Ellis told Pulse on Monday.
However Ellis would not comment as to when the long-delayed report would be released.
The action plan was originally scheduled for release in June 2025, then in late 2025, then April this year, then June. But as of August, it still has not been published.
The cable car remains deeply divisive.
The government’s ‘Our Mountain’s Future’ report, one of the initial stages of the government’s mountain review, found support for the cable car ranged from just 20% among Hobart residents to 62% in Brighton.
A previous 2.6-kilometre cable car proposal was knocked back by Hobart City Council in 2021 and the Tasmanian Civil and Administrative Tribunal in 2022, with around 72% of the record 16,500 public submissions opposing it.
Greens MP Vica Bayley previously described the government’s mountain review process as “a stitch-up,” saying the community and TASCAT have repeatedly rejected the idea.
“The TASCAT process showed that you can’t build a cable car up this mountain and still protect the values that people hold special,” Bayley said in November.
