Masudul Hoque & Abdur Rahman Jahangir, UNB Staff Writers
Dhaka, Feb 4 – Bangladesh Bridge Authority (BBA) has worked out a plan to construct a 220-km elevated expressway with a multimodal transport corridor over the existing Dhaka-Chittagong highway to boost trade ensuring faster communication between the two major cities.Once the elevated expressway is constructed with rail tracks costing Tk 80,000 crore, passengers will be able to travel from Dhaka-Chittagong-Dhaka by speedy trains. One way trip will take one hour by trains and two hours by buses, BBA officials said.
They also said a Chinese investor is keen to implement the entire project on Build-Own-Operate-Transfer (BOOT) basis or under a government-to-government arrangement.
Transport and urban experts think elevated expressway is a better option than the at-grade (through land) one given the country’s shrinking land.
Besides, they said, Tk 13,640 crore will have to be spent only on land acquisition and relocating other establishments apart from destroying a large number of houses, mega structures, schools and mosques to construct the at-grade expressway.
Under the circumstances, BBA executive engineer Wahiduzzamn told UNB that they have taken an initiative for building the 220-km elevated expressway with a multimodal transport corridor.
He said Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has approved the project summary after it was sent to her at the end of 2016.
Following the PM’s approval, Wahiduzzamn said, they have invited tender for conducting a feasibility study and 22 companies have submitted documents to take part in bidding.
“We’ll soon shortlist 4-7 companies examining their papers and then request them to submit their proposals to this end. We’ll complete the tender process within a short time and send the proposal to the Cabinet Purchase Committee for approval,” said BBA Chief Engineer Kabir Ahmed.
He hoped that the work on the feasibility study of the project will start within six months with the cabinet body’s approval. “We hope the work on the elevated expressway project will begin in early 2020.”
He said, “A Chinese investor has already given us a proposal to implement the project. We’re evaluating it. The investing company is willing to collect toll for 30 years on completion of the project and then hand it over to us. We’re bargaining to fix it at 25 years instead of 30.”
Justifying the project, Kabir said it will not only ease traffic and make it faster, but also save huge agricultural land, bazaars, mosques, educational institutions and establishments from destruction by constructing another expressway through land.
Besides, he said, huge goods can be transported through freight trains from 10pm to 5am through the elevated expressway as there will be no pressure of passengers at that time.
Talking to UNB, Transport expert and Buet Prof Shamsul Haque said, “To the best of my knowledge, the Prime Minister has already approved elevated expressway. I also personally think we should go for this option instead of at-grade one.”
He said it is not possible to control the operation and ensure unhindered vehicular movement on at-grade expressway as it is usually pass through many bazaars and establishments while there will have no such problems in the case of elevated expressway.
“Dhaka-Chittagong Highway is our economic corridor. We should ensure multimodal transport corridor on this route integrating land use. Developing roads by acquiring land is an old and simple method,” Prof Haque added.
Urban expert and UGC ex-chairman, Prof Nazrul Islam also echoed Haque saying at-grade expressway will be feasible very costly for the country for many reasons, including land shortage and density of population.
“As we’re now moving ahead to be a middle-income country, we should improve our transport sector and infrastructure for easy and faster transportation of goods and passengers. Elevated expressway can be a vital option in this regard.” – UNB
