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River crossings

For thirteen years ferries operated between Green point and Hestercombe, near Black Snake (settlement), and crossed the gap from the end of the Bridgewater Causeway until the bridge was finished.

A hand-operated punt crossed the Derwent at Risdon which later became motorized, running until 1976.

From 1816, a ferry operated between Austins Ferry and Old Beach, several kilometres south of the existing Bridgewater crossing. The ferry connected to a road to Launceston.

A second ferry operated from 1821, closer to Bridgewater, between Black Snake and Cove Point. While ferries were an integral form of transport, carrying livestock and goods as well as passengers, they were risky and unreliable, and seen as a hindrance to the prosperity of the new colony.

In 1818, a ferry capsized killing 12 people on board, including the captain, with only one survivor. Eight years later, in 1826, a committee was set up to consider a safer and more convenient way to cross the river.

This committee first decided on a timber bridge to be built near Black Snake. However, after review, the decision was made to construct a causeway.

This was built by as many as 280 convicts beginning construction in 1830.

SS Taranna passing through the railway swing bridge at Bridgewater heading to New Norfolk 1932
SS Taranna passing through the railway swing bridge at Bridgewater heading to New Norfolk 1932. Source: https://www.flickr.com/photos/29903115

Ferries, vehicles and trains used the River Derwent crossing as a significant transport route between the suburbs Bridgewater and Granton.

Construction of the Causeway started in 1830 and was completed in 1836. By 1849 the first timber construction road bridge was completed and just under thirty years later a second swing span rail bridge was completed adjacent to the road bridge.

Construction on a combined road and rail bridge that featured an operational lifting span started in 1933 and was opened in 1946 with road and rail traffic using the same structure for the first time.

For 140 years rail services used the bridge to cross the River Derwent, until 2014 when trains transporting goods to Hobart were no longer required.

Austin’s Ferry (between 1830 and 1840?). Boyes, G. T. W. B. (George Thomas William Blamey), 1787-1853
Austin’s Ferry (between 1830 and 1840?). Boyes, G. T. W. B. (George Thomas William Blamey), 1787-1853 Source: State Library of Tasmania, SD_ILS:142652

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