Speeding up traffic reforms

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Mahmudur Rahman
Quite a lot has been said in recent times about the speed with which the government is moving. The recent cabinet reshuffle for all of the camouflage of managing big budgets is undoubtedly aimed at speeding up governance. This on its own comes somewhat of dichotomy. After all why just comment on the speed of government when one considers the oodles of time wasted by Dhaka commuters in merely getting to work and back.
So much money, effort and time has been spent on devising ways to free the capital of traffic snarls that one feels it has been debated to death. Action however, is not forthcoming. The caretaker government in its two years was able to come up with two crucial road connections without which there would have been a total gridlock. A third project -- the Begunbari link -- appears to have fallen back but will surely contribute to a further easing of the situation.
Unfortunately demand is outstripping supply so quickly that we seem to be back to the old days. More East-West connector roads are needed as are flyovers but in between something simply has to be done about the numbers of new cars that hit the roads on a daily basis. The issue is that the older cars are not being phased out to make way and the absence of parking facilities simply compounds the situation.
At one stage, the idea of zoning of public transport was raised but that seems to have fallen by the way. Increasing numbers of roads are being made rickshaw-free and the relief that has provided has been gobbled up with alarming speed by public transport and private vehicles.
A British expert said in Dhaka recently that the solution lies not in creating new roads but controlling the numbers of vehicles. What he said does make sense. The roads of Dhaka were designed for a certain number of vehicles and it can be said without hesitation that those numbers have far exceeded than what had been planned for. Load management, a crucial factor in the construction of roads has been thrown to the dogs resulting in the life of roads coming down alarmingly, belying cost efficiency of road projects.
Different countries have come up with diverse strategies to cope with the size of their land. Singapore taxation makes ownership of new cars so expensive that people prefer to depend on an efficient mass transit situation. And the laws are tough on vehicles that have outlived their tenure. Dubai's licensing system is strict. There, people tend to depend on the taxis that are plentiful in supply and rarely refuse to go to a given location. Fares are structured accordingly. Even in Dhaka taxis and CNGs would abide by the fare structure if they didn't have to waste so much time in traffic jams.
It is often said that government needs to take the difficult decision in the honeymoon days shortly after coming to power. This is one that really does need to be taken. After all, time is not on our side. (The writer is a former head of corporate and regulatory affairs of British-American Tobacco Bangladesh and former CEO of Bangladesh Cricket Board. He can be reached at mahmudrahman@gmail.com)