HUTCHIES’ A QUARTERLY MAGA ZINE FOR HUTCHINSON BUILDERS
AUGUST 2026
MONA’S TUNNEL OF LOVE
The tunnel walkway carved through Triassic sandstone leads directly to the underground heart of the museum.
Images: Supplied by MONA. Credit: Jesse Hunniford.
HUTCHIES built an underground tunnel for lovers of art to enter the world-famous Museum of Old and New Art (MONA) in Hobart, Tasmania. MONA is privately owned and funded by Tasmanian, David Walsh, who describes it as a "subversive adult Disneyland,” focused on two central themes of sex and death. Walsh’s pet project has supercharged the Tasmanian tourism and hospitality industry by doing for Hobart what the Guggenheim Museum did for Bilbao, Spain – bringing an influx of tourists to the city each year. Hutchies’ jetty tunnel, a $5.9 million subterranean walkway connecting the Derwent River ferry terminal directly to the underground heart of the museum, gives visitors an alternative to climbing 99 steps from the river waterfront to the main entrance. Hutchies delivered the project without disruption to the operation of the museum,
The MONA jetty tunnel provides access from a jetty terminal on the Derwent River. while providing safety for workers undertaking high-risk activities. Methods included using a river barge for construction access and full-body personal protection equipment (PPE) and extraction systems to eliminate exposure to silica dust during boring operations in the Triassic sandstone. A height-adjustable cage for the installation
of rock anchors used modified digging equipment which tunnelled six metres at a time and allowed plant operators to work safely outside of the unsupported zone. Designed by Nonda Katsalidis Architects, the tunnel won Hutchies both the Work Health & Safety Award and Civil Construction Award from Master Builders Tasmania. Museum founder, David Walsh, originally opened a small, private gallery on the same site in 2001 called the Moorilla Museum of Antiquities. He then spent years excavating into the sandstone cliff on the Derwent River to build a museum of old and new art, in a sprawling, subterranean labyrinth of galleries, which officially opened in 2011 as MONA – the largest privately funded museum in the Southern Hemisphere. Hutchies is continuing its relationship with MONA with ongoing expansion projects.
Hutchies’ annual Training Awards ~ See full round-up Pages 12, 13