Growing slums and traffic jams of Dhaka: Solution lies in national technological ability
Wednesday, 19 August 2009
Mustafizur Rahman
It is already too late. Further delay will make efforts more expensive or even impossible, but wrong quick starts may also be fatal to national interest. Things are growing too complex to get over with a few loan-driven projects, often hunted by some of those who are close to power. Local engineering firms ought to be engaged for technical solution of engineering problems only. We must build up capability, and learn how to trust our own people to build our infrastructures.
A new Ministry of National Development and Planning directly headed by the head of the government should be created to integrate and coordinate city as well as national infrastructures planning and avoid mess with physical facilities that may later prove to be road blocks to future development.
New institutions like Public Utilities Service Corporation and Urban Redevelopment Authority may be established under the above Ministry of National Development and Planning. The Water and Sewerage Authority (WASA) should be given the responsibility of drainage and effluent treatment as well, and may be renamed as Water and Sewerage Development Authority (WASDA).
Dhaka Transport Coordination Board (DTCB) created at the insistence of the World Bank (WB) to facilitate its dealing with a single organization through its own consultants, as they usually prefer as a policy or conditionality, could not serve the purpose, apparently because of feud between Dhaka City Corporation ( DCC) and the Ministry of Communication over the control of DTCB.
World Bank financed DTCB for a study and preparation of a Strategic Transport Plan (STP) for Dhaka by WB consultants who virtually compiled the numerous past government studies in the form of its proposed plan with the addition of impractical Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) along Pragati Sharani and a few other existing bus routes, citing irrelevant reference to thinly populated cities like Bogota.
DTCB formed a steering committee, later renamed as Advisory Committee, chaired by Dr. Jamilur Reza Chowdhury. The Committee had more than twenty multi-disciplinary local experts working voluntarily for about two years to contribute to rescue of Dhaka from too fast growing slums and traffic jams. The advisory committee could not accept the consultant’s plan except for the suggestion of a few east-west roads and immediate acquisition of the right-of-way for as many new roads as possible before it becomes impossible to find any land for such roads.
The committee put forward its own recommendations for inclusion in the STP. Probably the smell of $5.2 billion World Bank support over 20 years energized the caretaker government to form a secretarial committee to see to the STP and get it approved by the cabinet in the last days of its term without seeking any technical guidance from the Advisory Committee. Meanwhile many unsolicited and arbitrary projects are being rushed, which might stand as road blocks to future development in the absence of a complete plan for making Dhaka a beautiful, futuristic, slum-free, livable capital city suited to our needs.
The STP includes about 74 projects of roads, link roads, elevated expressway, and bus rapid transit (BRT) lines, metro lines, subways, etc. We, the members of the advisory committee totally discarded the idea of BRT in consideration of lack of 5- or 6-by two roads in Dhaka. The consultants still kept it as an option. The consultant’s suggestion of relocation of Kamalapur station to Tongi was totally unacceptable to us.
We hear of Jatrabari-Gulistan flyover, eight or so flyovers over railway crossings in the city as a political media response to recent news of accident at Mogbazar crossing. The government is seemingly encouraging Thai and Malaysian investment in flyovers and highways, forgetful of their short experience of less than twenty to thirty years. Many interested quarters including international lending agencies are persistently hoodwinking our government to agree to such and other construction and infrastructure projects on BOT (Build-Operate-and Transfer) basis on the plea that government will not have to invest and Bangladeshi companies being still too small and financially unsound for large infrastructure building. The door is virtually being opened only to the foreign companies and sovereign fund managers, who are making frenzied efforts for opportunity to invest in monopolistic government-guaranteed infrastructure or financial institutes or quick-profit yielding real estate or other service sectors in weaker countries. Such foreign investment is restricted in most countries conscious of their national interest.
It is wished that euphoria about foreign direct investment ( FDI) of any nature shall not lead our government to long-term self defeating decision. Can or should Bangladesh, with its level of economy, pay domestic transport fare or toll in foreign exchange? Domestic infrastructure building is a long-term job generator for the nation for years, which also helps induction of technology and expertise necessary for preparing a country for economic take-off. All these must be relevant to the final plan of vision.
Big cities need a combination of surface road, overhead road, railway or subway or elevated railway, public bus transport and, in specific cases, water way transport. In view of the present traffic congestion and increase in population in the city, there must be built massive mass rail transit and additional non-interfering infrastructure in right sequence. Now we must find out what we should and can do immediately, possibly with our own resource and with our own earned expertise.
Some proposals are outlined here to make our move towards mass rail transit , which a mega city like Dhaka cannot go without. Ours is a small country with very high population density. Mass rail transit cannot fail economically. If cities are connected to suburban areas by elevated lines running even above wet lands, and fast inter-city trains are introduced, the low-income people will try to live in their own village home and educate their children there with their own social identity, while commuting to cities for work. Sub-human living in slums must be gotten away with as early as possible, may be within not more than 15 years.
Tongi-Tejgaon -Kamalapur-Saidabad section for commuter service: Ideally this section shall be a 4-line elevated railway for commuter and long-distance trains. About 20 to 25 stations may be built at distances from about 0.70 to 1.5 km. The recent quick-fix ad hoc proposal of building some flyovers over the Tongi- Kamalapur railway crossings is simply a sick idea that will repeat the problem of Mohakhali, when someday we shall have to build the four-line overhead commuter-cum long-distance railway. (Fig. 1).
It is already too late. Further delay will make efforts more expensive or even impossible, but wrong quick starts may also be fatal to national interest. Things are growing too complex to get over with a few loan-driven projects, often hunted by some of those who are close to power. Local engineering firms ought to be engaged for technical solution of engineering problems only. We must build up capability, and learn how to trust our own people to build our infrastructures.
A new Ministry of National Development and Planning directly headed by the head of the government should be created to integrate and coordinate city as well as national infrastructures planning and avoid mess with physical facilities that may later prove to be road blocks to future development.
New institutions like Public Utilities Service Corporation and Urban Redevelopment Authority may be established under the above Ministry of National Development and Planning. The Water and Sewerage Authority (WASA) should be given the responsibility of drainage and effluent treatment as well, and may be renamed as Water and Sewerage Development Authority (WASDA).
Dhaka Transport Coordination Board (DTCB) created at the insistence of the World Bank (WB) to facilitate its dealing with a single organization through its own consultants, as they usually prefer as a policy or conditionality, could not serve the purpose, apparently because of feud between Dhaka City Corporation ( DCC) and the Ministry of Communication over the control of DTCB.
World Bank financed DTCB for a study and preparation of a Strategic Transport Plan (STP) for Dhaka by WB consultants who virtually compiled the numerous past government studies in the form of its proposed plan with the addition of impractical Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) along Pragati Sharani and a few other existing bus routes, citing irrelevant reference to thinly populated cities like Bogota.
DTCB formed a steering committee, later renamed as Advisory Committee, chaired by Dr. Jamilur Reza Chowdhury. The Committee had more than twenty multi-disciplinary local experts working voluntarily for about two years to contribute to rescue of Dhaka from too fast growing slums and traffic jams. The advisory committee could not accept the consultant’s plan except for the suggestion of a few east-west roads and immediate acquisition of the right-of-way for as many new roads as possible before it becomes impossible to find any land for such roads.
The committee put forward its own recommendations for inclusion in the STP. Probably the smell of $5.2 billion World Bank support over 20 years energized the caretaker government to form a secretarial committee to see to the STP and get it approved by the cabinet in the last days of its term without seeking any technical guidance from the Advisory Committee. Meanwhile many unsolicited and arbitrary projects are being rushed, which might stand as road blocks to future development in the absence of a complete plan for making Dhaka a beautiful, futuristic, slum-free, livable capital city suited to our needs.
The STP includes about 74 projects of roads, link roads, elevated expressway, and bus rapid transit (BRT) lines, metro lines, subways, etc. We, the members of the advisory committee totally discarded the idea of BRT in consideration of lack of 5- or 6-by two roads in Dhaka. The consultants still kept it as an option. The consultant’s suggestion of relocation of Kamalapur station to Tongi was totally unacceptable to us.
We hear of Jatrabari-Gulistan flyover, eight or so flyovers over railway crossings in the city as a political media response to recent news of accident at Mogbazar crossing. The government is seemingly encouraging Thai and Malaysian investment in flyovers and highways, forgetful of their short experience of less than twenty to thirty years. Many interested quarters including international lending agencies are persistently hoodwinking our government to agree to such and other construction and infrastructure projects on BOT (Build-Operate-and Transfer) basis on the plea that government will not have to invest and Bangladeshi companies being still too small and financially unsound for large infrastructure building. The door is virtually being opened only to the foreign companies and sovereign fund managers, who are making frenzied efforts for opportunity to invest in monopolistic government-guaranteed infrastructure or financial institutes or quick-profit yielding real estate or other service sectors in weaker countries. Such foreign investment is restricted in most countries conscious of their national interest.
It is wished that euphoria about foreign direct investment ( FDI) of any nature shall not lead our government to long-term self defeating decision. Can or should Bangladesh, with its level of economy, pay domestic transport fare or toll in foreign exchange? Domestic infrastructure building is a long-term job generator for the nation for years, which also helps induction of technology and expertise necessary for preparing a country for economic take-off. All these must be relevant to the final plan of vision.
Big cities need a combination of surface road, overhead road, railway or subway or elevated railway, public bus transport and, in specific cases, water way transport. In view of the present traffic congestion and increase in population in the city, there must be built massive mass rail transit and additional non-interfering infrastructure in right sequence. Now we must find out what we should and can do immediately, possibly with our own resource and with our own earned expertise.
Some proposals are outlined here to make our move towards mass rail transit , which a mega city like Dhaka cannot go without. Ours is a small country with very high population density. Mass rail transit cannot fail economically. If cities are connected to suburban areas by elevated lines running even above wet lands, and fast inter-city trains are introduced, the low-income people will try to live in their own village home and educate their children there with their own social identity, while commuting to cities for work. Sub-human living in slums must be gotten away with as early as possible, may be within not more than 15 years.
Tongi-Tejgaon -Kamalapur-Saidabad section for commuter service: Ideally this section shall be a 4-line elevated railway for commuter and long-distance trains. About 20 to 25 stations may be built at distances from about 0.70 to 1.5 km. The recent quick-fix ad hoc proposal of building some flyovers over the Tongi- Kamalapur railway crossings is simply a sick idea that will repeat the problem of Mohakhali, when someday we shall have to build the four-line overhead commuter-cum long-distance railway. (Fig. 1).