“Maria Island is one of Tasmania’s great untapped tourism opportunities. We want to unleash its full potential.” Thus spake Matthew Groom in an article in the Mercury on Saturday November 21. ( Read Matthew Groom’s Media Release here )
Matt is a little late off the mark. I wrote pieces to this effect both in the Mercury and in the somewhat more widely read Australian Gourmet Traveller some five years ago after an unforgettable family holiday on the island.
So far the original Maria Island Walk has notched up seventeen national and state awards, including three from aforementioned magazine, as the nation’s finest nature experience.
So why has it taken Groom so long to wake up?
More importantly why does he and his witless colleagues continue to bang on about the former Triabunna Mill?
Not only did we have the farce of a post-mortem sale inquiry headed by the gormless Guy Barnett, we now have the local mayor voicing ‘concerns’ about Graeme Wood’s visionary plan for the Spring Bay Mill.
Opponents of this scheme are the Tasmanian branch of ISIS; their behaviour dictated by the Koran of the Liberal Party playbook.
The synergy between Mr Wood’s scheme and Maria Island’s appeal are obvious to all but the brain-dead.
And imagine the impact on dozy, depressed Orford.
Wood seems to have trumped his enemies with the purchase of the marina adjacent to his holdings.
Time for Government and for municipal mini-moguls to get out of the way of a desirable development, support tourism ventures and abandon the folly of forestry.
The government continually trumpets that ‘Tasmania is open for business.”
Except, it seems, for mainlanders with splendid ideas to boost tourism.
• Leo Schofield in Comments: … it’s words like ‘unleash’ that scare the living daylights out of me. Keep Maria as it is. No need to see it as another Port Arthur. The resort and marina suggestions were for the Triabunna mill site. How long is it since Graeme Wood bought this site and revealed his terrific plans. Then came Gormless Guy and his expensive and pointless inquiry into what was a done deal. Read the transcript of some of the sessions of said inquiry. Feydeau could not have done better …
