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large natural (roadless) areas

The sheer size and diversity of ecosystems found within the Tarkine Wilderness makes it a refuge from which many Tasmanian endemic, threatened, migratory and vagrant species can feed, breed, disperse and recolonise other areas where their populations have fared poorly.

The Tarkine Wilderness hosts Tasmania's greatest density of high quality wild rivers remaining outside existing World Heritage Areas (Commonwealth of Australia 1997). The entire catchments and sub-catchments of several major rivers remain remote and largely inaccessible. These include the:

• Pedder, Wild Wave, Thornton, Lagoon and Interview Rivers on the west coast
• Donaldson, Little Donaldson, Upper Rapid and Savage Rivers further inland, and
• Huskinson and Wilson Rivers in the south-east

The ecological integrity and continued evolution in these catchments have remained unaffected by human development.

Save for some short unsealed and unused roads at its fringes, and an unsealed service road (closed to the public), between the Savage River mine and the Bass Strait Coast, the Tarkine Wilderness remained roadless until January 1996. Then the Tasmanian Government completed the infamous 'Road to Nowhere' between Balfour to Corinna. The road is unsealed and open to the public. Government figures show that in 1997 an average of 17 vehicular movements occurred along this road per day. By 1999 the figure fell to 14. This road's completion has been the only significant infrastructure development in the area since the Savage River mine began operating in 1967.

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