As a major carrier of heavy freight for Tasmanian industry, the railway's 784 km freight-only network, operated by 180 staff, offers customers responsive rail transport services. Tasrail Pty Ltd transports about 2 million tonnes a year around Tasmania and there is great potential to expand that on an island where imports and exports exceed 10 million tonnes per annum.

Tasrail Pty Ltd covers an average distance of 200 km, compared with 65 km handled by road transport. Based on distance, Tasrail Pty Ltd hauls about 20% of the total land based transport task in Tasmania, making it a vital cog in the state transport operations. Major haulage includes cement, wood chips and other logs, containers, coal, sulphuric acid, minerals and fertiliser.

More than $55 million has been spent on track and bridge upgrading since 1976. Upgrading of the infrastructure will continue until the entire network is at a standard to allow 72 tonne gross loaded wagons to travel at 80 kmh.

Some years ago, Tasrail Pty Ltd's locomotive fleet was boosted with the purchase of 16 ZB and 45 ZC class locomotives from Queensland while more than 400 high capacity wagons have been obtained from Tasrail Pty Ltd's mainland system.

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