Perhaps we interpreted the article differently rpg. This is quite likely given our views.

When I talk about balance...I mean that some areas should be put aside for different types of activity. It's not about trying to fit all types of activity, or access, into one area - that approach merely dilutes the experience for all.

In my opinion, balance is saying that - OK, this area can be put aside for wilderness, and another area can be developed for beach resorts, another for semi-rural activites such as wine and food tourism, another for cultural tourism, another for urban development, another for agriculture etc. Many of of these may be able to co-exist too.

However, the trick is to understand that some activities do not co-exist very well. For example, a walk track through a forest is unlikely to impact on the enjoyment of car drivers driving through the forest, however, a road will impact on the enjoyment that bushwalkers get from being out in the wilderness. If you put the two together you are impacting far more on the walkers than the drivers. That is why many are so passionate about keeping roads out of wilderness areas if this is possible.

I don't do much walking any more, but I want there to be wilderness areas for others to go walking in. Perhaps it is a losing battle...but it is a battle worth fighting.

Don't be too hard on the poor walkers, RPG, after all, if someone puts a road in, they will be forced to walk along the edge of it. They could never use a different trail.

Besides, where's the skite value in claiming to have been somewhere that other mere mortals can get to.

As an old bloke, who can not manage more than a few hundred yards on foot, don't I have any "rights" now, well not with this mob, anyway. The fact that I was too busy paying for their schooling to go before, when I could walk, has nothing to do with it.

I don't like trail bikes much either, but to turn a whole bl@@dy forrest into a muddy battle field, get real.

I know, I'll take my hores. I may stay in the nsw/vic high country instead, as I'm not welcome in Tasy. But, hang on, my horse is being excluded from there too. May be some walker trod in his droppings, & that would never do.

If there is anything contaminating the wilderness, it's these smug yobs, stay away, it may be catching.

Hasbeen - there is nothing more enjoyable than being out in the wild with on a horse, but.....

Locally in the ACT or NSW I can take a horse just about anywhere. I can camp out where I choose with 4 legged transport. So I don't think I need to take a horse into the Tarkine. There are other places to go - most of that is already sadly degraded and altered.

Wilderness has value other than that which walkers give it as a recreation area. It has conservation value. By carving a road into pristine areas, we give feral predators and weeds the same access that we give the cars and people.

Bushwalkers hopefully are aware of the impact that they can have, thought they don't always behave impecably. A road though, is a highway for other things into Wilderness areas other than people, and should be avoided unless truly necessary.

Ps down in Tassie, try the Narawntapu National Park. Nice horse yards and the best beach anywhere in Australia!

Good article, gets it pretty right. I live in Tas, am a walker, horse rider and have friends who ride quad bikes. They have ample area's to use their bikes and appreciate pristine wilderness, however there are those who would go anywhere they could and bugger the consequences. As well as those who would lock up everything, for what reason I don't know. We have the extension of the national horse trail from top to bottom and many great and testing areas we can ride. It's the wilderness area's which are out of bounds and I don't know a Tassie trail rider who disagrees, but accept there would be some.

Tassie is one of the last islands in the world which has the chance to retain it's environment and use it to show the world how it's done. That would have huge economic benefits for us, unlike the approaches of forestry and the lab/lib slaves of the ruling corporate junta.

In Tas, there are bays with magnificent beaches only reached by sea, it's a rare experience in this dying world of ours. Not only is the Tarkine facing problems, but so it the Tasman peninsula. Down there, they have a magnificent coastal walk which is about 5-7 days. It takes you along some of the highest sea cliffs in the Southern Hemisphere, magnificent bays and wildlife. The vested interests want to privatise it and put exclusive resorts along the trail accessed by helicopter as its in national park.

But who cares, as long as the urban cowboys can get their kicks, that's all that counts.

The article doesn't say it, but my understanding is that almost all of the planned Tarkine road already exists as various bush tracks and that the new road will be a major upgrading of them with some new linkages. Unless I've got this wrong, this is somewhat different to the impression given that this is a new road being bulldozed into the wilderness.

As a former Tasmanian resident and frequent visitor for the purposes of bushwalking and trout fishing, I can certainly understand the sentiments most often expressed here. However, I am constantly bemused by 'environmentalists' who claim that Tasmania's future rests on tourism, but who then refuse to countenance the forms of tourism that are most likely to make significant dollars - ie. 'state of the art' eco-accommodation linked to spectacular natural features a la Freycinet and Cradle Mountain.

Personally I avoid those areas (too many tourists!), but they are where the money is - whereas most tourism authorities regard undeveloped wilderness as generally attracting cheap tourists only on a seasonal basis who arrive with all their equipment and spend relatively little. If this is to underpin the economic future of Tasmania it is going to be pretty bleak.

Surely its not impossible to have both. The Tasmanian central plateau area provides a good precedent where the internationally significant Overland Track with developed huts and facilities at each end sits comfortably alongside undeveloped wilderness where you may go days without seeing a person although the tourist dollars are being spent just a few kilometres away. The Tarkine appears to be big enough for to suit a similar approach.