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A proposal for a 100-kilometre walking track through the Tarkine wilderness will be launched by the Bob Brown Foundation on Monday, with the hope of multi-partisan support. The multi-day experience, which starts one hour’s drive from Burnie and finishes at north Pieman Head at Corinna, is “long overdue” for the Tarkine, former Tourism Australia managing director and Corinna Wilderness Experience part-owner Ken Boundy said. “Tasmania has become a central focus for some of Australia’s great walks and having something of the proposed calibre of this walk in the Tarkine is certainly long overdue,” Mr Boundy said. “Here is one specific proposal that’s been able to make it this far and it builds on the back of two or three others. “I think the environment at the state level is good for it and I think also here is the proposal with a backer looking for further financial support.” Mr Boundy said the walk had been talked about for 15 years and some small sections were open through a private operator. But he said the new plan would provide the opportunity for great experience. It would also help to give people a greater appreciation of the region, which they always left with once they visited. “We have had literally thousands of people at Corinna over the last 10 years and they awareness of the natural assets has grown strongly. People become very interested and keep coming back,” he said. The proposal, to be revealed by the Bob Brown Foundation on Monday in Hobart, seeks federal funding for an impact assessment and business case for the Trans Tarkine Track. The cost of of the track infrastructure is estimated at $20 million, and would require a mix of public and private funding. A lack of sustainable tourism development in and around the Tarkine showed a “failure of political imagination”, Bob Brown Foundation chair Bob Brown said. “The idea of the proposal for Cradle Mountain and Three Capes Track is that the world wants to experience Tasmania’s dramatic wild country. “I think that here is a very clearly worked out alternative for the Tarkine which is not huge money compared to other proposals. “It’s illogical that the Tarkine isn’t seen in the same way.”

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