Country's decrepit bridge infrastructures

Sadly, the Roads and Highways Department (RHD) has been sorely lacking in fulfilling one of its primary duties over the years. The fact that it has taken 23 years for this government agency to inspect 5,188 bridges to ascertain their condition speaks volumes about its lack of capacity and a general apathy towards a key responsibility. This RHD's work being done with the assistance of Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) has brought to the surface some major deficiencies of the government agency. The infrastructure that has been inspected covers a number of bridges constructed between three to five decades ago and despite repeated complaints by people in the various localities they are situated in, it would seem that RHD never prioritised the quality of work done or how they have been faring since construction.

With nearly 90 per cent bridges still remaining under inspection, surely the time has arrived to introspect on this sorry state of affairs. Apparently, despite the country going into development overdrive, especially over the last 15 years, the RHD had been left bereft of some basic tools for it to assess and take corrective measures in the maintenance part of its mandate. The chronic shortage of technical manpower coupled with a lack of inspection manuals left RHD in a position that couldn't be called enviable. Most of RHD's work is outsourced to third parties and given that the department didn't have, till very recently, the inspection manuals needed to evaluate the quality of works done, it makes one wonder precisely what has been the quality of workmanship so far.

Communities that were supposed to get relief from these bridges were left in the lurch as years passed and no maintenance work was done. The lack of inspection meant that contractors were largely free to construct sub-standard bridges and culverts across the country, which in most cases was not durable. Unsurprisingly, those bridges and culverts fell into disuse long before their expected lifespans ended. It is inconceivable that policymakers have failed to make necessary allocations to increase the number of engineers in zonal offices over decades. Currently, the RHD only has four to five engineers in its zonal offices. Such paltry numbers of technical personnel in itself makes it simply impossible for these offices to do this herculean task.  Besides, these engineers have extensive and diverse duties which were considered to be more important than the fulfilling inspection role. Yet the RHD is supposed to be looking after bridge management.

Even if one takes into account that by 2015, RHD had come into possession of five inspection manuals, why were steps not taken at policy level to increase its manpower? As pointed out by a report published in this newspaper, "conducting a single bridge inspection with the JICA manuals takes several hours. Therefore, inspecting more than three to four bridges in a day is simply impossible for them." Naturally, these manuals were drawn up in a manner that would ensure road worthiness of crucial infrastructure like bridges. Inspection is essential not just from a safety point of view, it gives the government a clearer picture of the quality of its investment. Naturally, without any oversight, public works of the State are shoddily done.

For years, the RHD have been plagued by allegations of graft. Not just in handing out work to dubious elements, but also in a failure to uphold quality of workmanship. One would think that this foot-dragging in improving RHD capacity to do its job properly has been worked out over the years to benefit unscrupulous business practices and this needs to change to avoid much of the fatal road accidents and recurrent transportation disruptions nationwide.