29/09/2026
MEDIA RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
29 September 2026
Derwent Valley Railway congratulates Tasmanian Transport Museum on Granton corridor lease
The Derwent Valley Railway (DVR) congratulates the Tasmanian Transport Museum Society on the Tasmanian Government’s confirmation that the Museum’s rail corridor lease will be extended from Mentmore Street, Chigwell, through to Granton, including the former Granton railway station.
DVR Chairman Matthew Davey said the announcement was welcome news for heritage rail, visitor economies in the northern suburbs, and the case for keeping Tasmania’s historic passenger lines in use.
“This is a good day for heritage rail in southern Tasmania,” Mr Davey said. “The Tasmanian Transport Museum’s volunteers have already put passenger trains back on a section of line that sat idle for years. Extending that lease to Granton gives them the certainty to keep going — repair track, work through the safety regulator, and build a genuine historic tourism railway along the Derwent.”
The Museum received formal notification from Infrastructure Minister Kerry Vincent MLC. Building Tasmania is to begin surveys, corridor declarations and the parliamentary process required under the Strategic Infrastructure Corridors Act. The Museum has said the lease is not yet signed and that process is expected to take in the order of 12 months.
The Museum has held a corridor lease from Elwick Road, Glenorchy to Mentmore Street since 2021, commenced heritage operations in 2023, and has been running passenger services to Berriedale since December 2025.
“We support light passenger rail and historic tourism rail because it works,” Mr Davey said. “It brings people into towns, it keeps skills alive, and it uses infrastructure that is already there instead of ripping it up and calling that progress. What the Museum is doing at Glenorchy, and what we are doing in the Derwent Valley, is the same job on different stretches of the old network.”
DVR’s own work continues on the Derwent Valley Line. The organisation holds a 3.1 kilometre lease on the New Norfolk to Boyer corridor, is restoring track and rolling stock at New Norfolk, and remains committed to heritage passenger services toward Westerway and Mount Field National Park as access, safety accreditation and partnerships allow.
“These lines were built as one system,” Mr Davey said. “In time there is no reason southern Tasmania cannot have complementary heritage services — Glenorchy to Granton on one side of the river, and the Derwent Valley Line on the other — with room for statewide tours in partnership with the Transport Museum and Don River Railway. That only happens if governments keep leasing corridors to the volunteer groups who are prepared to do the work.”
DVR thanked the Museum’s volunteers and President Jeff Bronstein, and acknowledged Minister Vincent and Building Tasmania for moving the Granton lease forward.
“The significance of heritage rail should not be thrown away,” Mr Davey said. “Get the leases right, back the people on the ground, and get back on track.”
