A large number of roads and lanes in Dhaka city have the appearance of anything but roads

Many roads and lanes in Dhaka city remain in awful shape

The rainfall over the last fortnight or so   have led to disintegration of the surfaces of such roads creating hollows in too many places. Apart from increasing the risks of accidents, all kinds of   vehicles have to crawl like tortoises that force a commuter to reach his or her work place after wasting too long a time when it should normally take much less time. Rain water accumulated on potholes and ditches are thrown up as vehicles pass over them and splatter on the clothes of  pedestrians.
    Roads  in the city that had been repaired only 2-3 months back have astonishingly crumbled  after only  some days of raining. In some cases, this happened only some  weeks after their repairs. Dhaka city corporation (DCC) spent last year  an amount of 220 crore taka for repairing only about 50 kilometres  of road, sidewalks and dividers . But the greater part of these works seem to have been  wasted in vey poor quality work due to abysmal corruption.
   The  network of national highways are also in very bad conditions. Some horrible accidents have  already occurred in parts of such  highways and more are likely if these  are not repaired immediately.  Vast stretches of the Dhaka-Chittagong highway, the Dhaka-Tangail highway, the Dhaka-Khulna highway, the Dhaka-Sylhet and Dhaka-Aricha highway are in awful shape and also the arterial highways linked to them.
    Very big economic losses are taking place from such degraded conditions of the  highways as businesses are failing to reach goods to different destinations in time and also because of the higher transportation of goods charged for transportation over such bad highways.
   The state of the roads and highways  is proving to be a huge national problem. It is not enough to build roads. It is equally important, if not more, to maintain them in smooth serviceable conditions round the year. The smooth  churning of the wheels of the entire economy depend crucially on keeping fit the roads for fast movement of people and cargoes. And, of course, there is also the basic physical security of traveling people.
  The roads and highways need to be repaired on  a war footing., Reportedly, the World Bank (WB) has withheld release of funds for road building and maintenance  on grounds of corruption. Government must address this problem at the soonest to be considered for receipt of WB funds.

The writer is a contributor to theindependent

 

A large number of roads and lanes in Dhaka city have the appearance of anything but roads

Many roads and lanes in Dhaka city remain in awful shape

The rainfall over the last fortnight or so have led to disintegration of the surfaces of such roads creating hollows in too many places. Apart from increasing the risks of accidents, all kinds of vehicles have to crawl like tortoises that force a commuter to reach his or her work place after wasting too long a time when it should normally take much less time. Rain water accumulated on potholes and ditches are thrown up as vehicles pass over them and splatter on the clothes of pedestrians. Roads in the city that had been repaired only 2-3 months back have astonishingly crumbled after only some days of raining. In some cases, this happened only some weeks after their repairs. Dhaka city corporation (DCC) spent last year an amount of 220 crore taka for repairing only about 50 kilometres of road, sidewalks and dividers . But the greater part of these works seem to have been wasted in vey poor quality work due to abysmal corruption. The network of national highways are also in very bad conditions. Some horrible accidents have already occurred in parts of such highways and more are likely if these are not repaired immediately. Vast stretches of the Dhaka-Chittagong highway, the Dhaka-Tangail highway, the Dhaka-Khulna highway, the Dhaka-Sylhet and Dhaka-Aricha highway are in awful shape and also the arterial highways linked to them. Very big economic losses are taking place from such degraded conditions of the highways as businesses are failing to reach goods to different destinations in time and also because of the higher transportation of goods charged for transportation over such bad highways. The state of the roads and highways is proving to be a huge national problem. It is not enough to build roads. It is equally important, if not more, to maintain them in smooth serviceable conditions round the year. The smooth churning of the wheels of the entire economy depend crucially on keeping fit the roads for fast movement of people and cargoes. And, of course, there is also the basic physical security of traveling people. The roads and highways need to be repaired on a war footing., Reportedly, the World Bank (WB) has withheld release of funds for road building and maintenance on grounds of corruption. Government must address this problem at the soonest to be considered for receipt of WB funds. The writer is a contributor to theindependent