RHD facing challenges due to uncontrolled traffic hike

The Roads and Highways Department (RHD) is facing tremendous challenges in carrying out road development and maintenance work due to what its officials said 'uncontrolled increase in traffic with vehicles of different speeds and spaces'.

The state agency is facing pressure to manage 13 types of vehicles during road construction and management.

Besides, procuring 90 per cent import-based construction materials, unnecessary delay in handing over land and utility shifting, and uncontrolled plying of overloaded vehicles have also been challenges for the engineers to keep cost and time of projects within limit.

RHD Chief Engineer Syed Moinul Hasan and his team analysed these factors during an opinion-exchange programme with the Reporters for Rail and Road (RRR) members at the RHD headquarters in the capital's Tejgaon area on Thursday.

"It's difficult to continue any road work keeping the existing one lane free for all modes of traffic, which increase without control," said the chief engineer.

He also said due to huge traffic pressure, adequate time for development of surface layers of roads cannot be ensured.

Echoing him, Sasec-2 Project Director Waliur Rahman said daily traffic during the Eid-ul-Azha was 32,000 in 2018, which increased to 64,000 during the same festival in 2024.

They even failed to calculate per car unit (PCU) to assess risk factors amid plying of different types of three-wheelers, he added.

Heads of RHD's different wings attended the meeting. They noted that cost and tenure of road development projects are becoming unmanageable, as there is no easy way to complete land acquisition and utility shifting before starting physical work.

The RHD officials claimed that the project cost also increases, as the lion's share of raw materials are import-based, whose purchase costs get 7-10 times higher to cross ports.

The chief engineer also claimed that the RHD is forced to pay money to the government agencies concerned to shift the utilities, like drainage and electric poles, although those were illegally placed on the agency's road alignment.

Answering to a question of dependency on foreign consultants, he said more than 95 per cent of the projects are designed and constructed with the RHD's engineers. The foreign-aided projects mostly have foreign consultants as per the development partners' requirement.

At present, 103 projects are implemented, of which only seven are foreign-aided, where the RHD engineers are also contributing their merit and effort, he added.

The RHD officials also highlighted the problems of uncontrolled plying of overloaded vehicles on the roads and highways as well as lack of integration of laws, which are damaging the country's road infrastructure.

smunima@yahoo.com