Wikipedia talk:Peer review/Inveresk and York Park Precinct, Launceston/archive1

Geography and History of the Precinct

The level site, located beside the North Esk River was the original base for the Tasmanian rail system and grew to become a significant industrial area, housing a railway station, marshalling yards and maintenance workshops. Flooding was a perennial issue for the whole Inveresk suburb; a major flood with loss of life occurred in 1929. This risk was mitigated by levee construction in subsequent decades. The railway function was relocated in the 1980s. This left behind a 16 hectare site, heavily contaminated by heavy metals and hydrocarbons and numerous buildings with industrial heritage significance. Redevelopment of the site was deemed to be commercially prohibitive by the heritage and contamination constraints. However the City of Launceston was able to obtain Commonwealth and State government funding to embark on a programme of decontamination, rehabilitation and adaptive reuse of the buildings and marshalling yards. Those works enabled the relocation of the Royal Agricultural Show to Inveresk and the conversion of that organisation’s former Showgrounds site at Elphin for residential and educational uses. The workshop buildings were the subject of a major heritage investigation and many were able to be retained as part of an expanded Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery. 124.169.83.130 (talk) 21:20, 4 October 2024 (UTC)