A city of potholes

Trackback URL

Download PDF

Bumpy roads, encroached road widths and missing manholes lids all this is making life for the common city resident more and more difficult each day, especially now with the monsoon rains.

The number of uncovered manholes over the entire stretch of the city poses serious threat to the safety of people using these roads.

A large number of lanes and by-lanes in the city, including those at Mirpur section-1, 6, 7, 10 and 11, Senpara Parbata, Kazipara, Shewrapara, Monipur, Modhyabagh, Ahmed Nagar, Pirerbagh, Shantinagar, Rampura, Nakhalpara, Tejkunipara, Arjatpara, Colony Bazar, Karwan Bazar, Tejgaon Truck Stand Road, Shahidnagar, Islambagh and many roads in Mohammadpur remain in extremely poor condition to use.

These also are some of the more populated areas of the capital and are used by people who have to commute distances on foot.

On the other hand, added to the pain of bumpy and narrow roads is the missing manhole lids in the city — a large number of manholes remain uncovered at different places in the city especially at Shantinagar and Old Dhaka due to lack of attention by authorities concerned.

These open holes become death traps for people even in good weather — leave alone when the roads are inundated by rainwater.

Md Abdul Gafur, owner of Asia Automatic Dry Cleaners at 10-A, Shantibagh, said he had an iron pipe put over an uncovered manhole in front of his shop to partially cover it. That was two years ago after a few accidents occurred with this manhole a few people including a pregnant woman, walked into the uncovered hole and were badly hurt.

And that’s how it remained till date.

There are about 20 uncovered manholes in the Shantinagar area alone. Yunus, a resident of the area, says that with waterlogging during rains, these manholes become death traps.

On Thursday alone last week, Yunus said, three men fell over in the waterlogged streets due to open manholes in the area. On the same day, the wheel of a school-van was caught in an open manhole.

The driver of the van somehow managed to balance the van, carrying children, in time to prevent what could have been a horrible accident.

It is not only the uncovered manholes but also the general condition of the roads that pose grave danger to all commuters, points out Nurul Amin, another resident of Shantinagar.

Like Shantinagar, many roads of Modhyabagh, Pirerbagh, Shewrapara and Arjatpara are in dire need of repair.

Abu Taher, a shopkeeper in Modhyabagh, said the main road in the area was constructed in 1989 and never repaired since.

Abu Talib, a rickshaw puller of the area, says,” ‘I have to work almost thrice as hard than on other roads to get my rickshaw going on the road stretching from Modhyabagh to Shewrapara.’

In many areas of the city, added to the bumpy roads is the fact that over the years road widths have lessened due to encroachment by residents or shop owners.

The road from Shewrapara to Pirerbagh has lost its width in this process over the years. Though the original road was supposed to be 60 foot wide, it now stands only 15 foot wide due to encroachment by house owners, residents say.

The Pirerbagh road was constructed in 1995 and has not been repaired since.

The condition of Tejgaon Truck Stand Road has deteriorated so much that rickshaw pullers refuse passengers on this route.. Students of the BG-Press high school in the area say that they have to walk on the bumpy road even during rains.

The DCC has spent about Tk 142 crore in the 2007-2008 fiscal for maintenance and development of road and traffic infrastructure, and yet the general condition of most lanes and by-lanes and parts of main thoroughfares of the city remain in very bad condition.

The DCC has set up a target of Tk 170.40 crore for the current fiscal for road and traffic maintenance and development, a DCC official said. He however pointed out that there was no allocation for ward and zone based road repair works last year.

Then there are the allegations of corruption during repair works. After allegations of misappropriation by many commissioners, contractors and a section of DCC officials during road works during the regime of the BNP-led four-party alliance government, the DCC authority has reduced the involvement of the commissioners and officials of different zones for repair works from last year, another official said.

Hazi Abdul Kader, ward commissioner of ward-14 and acting commissioner of ward-13 — which include Shewrapara, Mirpur Rokeya Sarani, Paribagh, Modhyabagh and Monipur — said although Tk 50 lakh was allocated for each of his wards, he did not receive a single penny in this regard in the last fiscal.

He said around 25 per cent of the road in his wards remain severely damaged and 25 per cent other is in need of some repair.

“To repair all these would require at least Tk 2 crore,” he estimated.

The commissioner also alleged that he made several attempts to widen the Shewrapara to Paribagh road but could not due to some ‘influential locals’ who have encroached a portion of the road.

Dhaka City Corporation (DCC) officials are not in the dark about the situation.

DCC Chief Engineer Ashfaqul Islam said they have taken up a plan in the current budget for repair works based on zones and wards.

“We will ensure the quality of the road this time so that they remain usable for at least 10 years,” he said. “’We will also take immediate steps regarding complaints about missing manhole covers in the city.”

Managing Director of Wasa Raihanul Abedin pointed out that around 10,000 manholes in the city are under the Wasa authority, the remaining are under the jurisdiction of DCC.

Manhole lids are often stolen for the value of metal. To counter this, DCC is thinking of using fibreglass lids. Fibreglass is a compound of plastic strengthened with short threads of glass and is cheaper than many metals.

DCC has already set 100 lids of fibreglass over the last two months on a pilot scheme.

Leave a Reply