TOWARDS PROMOTING EFFICIENT BRT in DHAKA

Dhaka the capital city of Bangladesh having a population of 15 million has a rudimentary public transport system comprising cycle rickshaws, para-transit, taxis and buses. The rapid rise in population along with increased and versatile urban land use patterns have generated considerable travel demand as well as numerous transport problems in the city. The capacity of the road is significantly reduced by poor operating conditions, inadequate traffic management and efficient road use. The number of privately owned cars, on the other hand, is increasing day by day because of undeveloped public transport system and lack of door to door services within public transport network. Major shares of road space remain occupied by small capacity vehicles. Buses being the only mode of mass transit available in Dhaka they carry about 1.9 million passengers per day. The share of mass transit is low, 27 percent of vehicular trips where walking and other non-motorized travels still remain as the dominant travel modes. In view of the worsening traffic congestion and deterioration in accessibility, level of service, comfort, safety and operational efficiency, it is time to introduce the Bus Rapid Transit (BRT). For achieving sustainable urban transport in Dhaka, the Strategic Transport Plan (STP) suggested the development of six major corridors as mass transit routes including three BRT corridors. It will start from Uttara and end to Sadarghat covering about 21.7 Kilometer road. In this paper an attempt has been made to provide an overview of the public transportation system in metro Dhaka in terms of the key issues, characteristics and improvement options. In particular the paper discusses the aspects and potentials of introducing BRT in Dhaka to cater for ever increasing public transport demand towards alleviation of congestion level and achieving a sustainable urban public transport system.

2012

Conference CODATU XV The role of urban mobility in (re)shaping cities 22 to 25 October 2012-Addis Ababa (Ethiopia) CODATU XV-Le rôle de la mobilité urbaine pour (re)modeler les villes 1 CODATU XV-Le rôle de la mobilité urbaine pour (re)modeler les villes 2 Conference CODATU XV « The role of urban mobility in (re)shaping cities »

Dhaka, the capital city of Bangladesh, is growing rapidly with an estimated population of over 15 million. The city's transport system is characterised by the critical and deteriorated traffic congestion and the poor public transport services: inefficiency, poor quality of services, lack of reliability and safety for commuters. In addressing the enormous public transport challenges and for achieving sustainable urban transport in Dhaka, the Strategic Transport Plan (STP) suggested the development of six major corridors as mass transit routes including three Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) corridors. In this paper an attempt has been made to discuss the concepts, needs and opportunities of the BRT system. The paper in particular highlights the Dhaka's transport problem characteristics and the potentials of the implementation of BRT system for enhanced and improved public transport services in Dhaka.

Proceedings of American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE): Urban Public Transportation Systems 2013, pp. 168-178.

Dhaka is one of the most densely populated cities in the world. The abrupt increase in population along with diverse urban land use patterns has engendered an ample travel demand. In addition, gradual deterioration of level of service of public transport system and increasing private car ownership create acute intolerable congestion. In these circumstances, Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) is one of the most effective short term solutions because of its high capacity as well as relatively low construction and operating cost. Despite the high opportunities of introducing BRT in Dhaka, it will face some operational difficulties such as high occupancy, high operational fleet size, small headway, priority in intersection and signal control, etc. Result shows that to satisfy the projected high passenger demand, the headway will be 16 seconds and operational fleet size; occupancy will be very high in many locations, which will make the BRT operation difficult and ineffective.

Dhaka, the capital city of Bangladesh with huge population pressure has to face different sorts of problems in different sectors. The most significant problem in the Dhaka City is transportation problem with severe traffic congestion, improper planning and inefficient management system, lack of proper integration among different type of modes, insufficient public contribution in this sector and so on. Due to these problems the people of the city have to suffer a lot in terms of time hammering, loss of money, inefficiency in their daily works. In the STP (Strategic Transport Plan) of Dhaka city, some proposal has been reported to solve the problems in which introducing BRT system in Dhaka city seems to be most useful one. But the detail design of BRT and management procedure to operate it has not yet been done. The paper provides a review of the existing transportation system of Dhaka and to carry out the design proposal for Bus Rapid Transit (BRT). It is not only concerned with the design but also to deal with the post implementation works like the operational management and fare collection process as well as the maintenance. The sustainability of the project would very much depend on these issues.

2017

Dhaka, one of the most densely populated cities in the world, has a population of almost 17 million, which is expected to rise to 35 million by 2035 (World Bank). The city currently suffers from various impacts caused by lack of affordable, inclusive, efficient and safe transport mode for mobilization of its people. Insufficient malfunctioning old small buses and some informal paratransit against the demand of such an enormous population causes several externalities; congestion, accidents, air pollution, and climate change. Due to increasing pressure on public transport, it has become necessary to opt for a more efficient means of transport mode for moving passengers. In this regard, to ease the congestion and provide a safe, affordable, comfortable, and environmentally friendly solution, Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) has been introduced to Dhaka.

Proceedings of the 1st …, 2011

Dhaka doesn't have a mature transport system. Lacking in institutional arrangements, policy and planning, and law enforcement, the transport system operates has developed ad hoc and is situationally problematic. Absence of proper coordination between modes, poor public transport system, inadequate pedestrian facilities, and environmental degradation justify full consideration of Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) in Dhaka. BRT centres on sustainable transport principles. BRT is a system, which is capable to mitigate Dhaka's transport problem if properly planned. In Strategic transport plan of Dhaka three BRT transport corridor has been proposed and BRT pre-feasibility study came up with one pilot corridor for early implementation of BRT. This paper first reviews international best practices then explores various BRT system packages and evaluates the suitability of these BRT packages by analyzing current bus service condition and physical and geometric configuration along the BRT pilot corridor. It concludes by proposing some BRT scenarios, which can be considered for further evaluation with respect to speed, delay, travel time and environmental pollution.

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2000

Like many other cities in developing countries Dhaka is struggling with the problem of how to upgrade and improve existing transit services at a low cost. The ever-increasing chaos and congestion, high rate of accidents and rapidly deteriorating transport operational, management and environmental condition calls for immediate considerations of an alternative transport option that could reduce the transport problem. In the way of searching a fruitful solution to the transport problem, various options are available. The experience of other developing countries (like Columbia, Jakarta) shows that implementation of a bus rapid transit option may come out successful. But, it is still questionable whether the modern space efficient mass transit system particularly introduce of BRT is feasible or not for the present road network system viz. quantity, quality, orientation, functionality as well as land use and transport network structure of this city. This study presents the prevailing transport and traveling scenario and the characteristics of existing mass transit system in Dhaka Metropolitan city. Particular emphasis has been made to assess the feasibility of BRT options as compared to the physical and infrastructural capacity of the road network of Dhaka city. Finally, a set of recommendations have been proposed to improve the physical, infrastructural and operational condition of the transportation system aims at introducing modern mass rapid transit system in Dhaka Metropolitan City to meet the future enormous demand.

Malaysian Journal of Civil Engineering

Cities in the developing world are faced with a challenge from the transport intensive land use development focused on personalized modes. Transit Oriented Development (TOD) is considered to be one of the most promising alternative city development strategies focusing on use of public transport. However, most of the high capacity public transport projects in cities of developing countries are coming up at a stage where the city corridors are already developed. Success of a public transport system depends on accessibility of passengers to its nodes. Field data collected from Gazipur Bangladesh shows accessibility to proposed BRT stations depends majorly on access road widths, besides it also depends on road condition, distance of access roads from BRT stations. Potential access roads are ranked with a scoring system and in-situ improvements are proposed to yield achievable results. Retrofitting improvement measures can enhance accessibility and increase ridership. To retain a sustain...

Dhaka, the capital city of Bangladesh, is the largest and most industrialized city with 15 million people. Due to rapid unplanned development, versatile land use, rapid population growth, poor public transport system and increase of private car users, traffic problems is worsening day by day. The only mass transit is bus which is insufficient in terms of safety, capacity, comfort and convenience. Considering the worsening congestion it is high time to develop effective mass transit system such as Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) as a means for achieving sustainable urban transport in the city. In this paper an attempt has been made to propose a conceptual physical structure of BRT for the line3 which starts from Uttara and ends in Ramna covering around 18.5 km. The BRT stations and runways are designed in a way to satisfy the ever increasing public transport demand towards achieving a sustainable urban public transport system.