Home-goers stuck for hrs on highways
The onrush of eid holidaymakers has pushed the country's narrow highway network to the brink of collapse and made people suffer even before they hit the road to go home to their families.
Due to gridlocks on highways, a journey that usually takes a couple of hours was in cases taking five to six hours.
Holidaymakers were yesterday seen at bus terminals waiting for their transport for hours on end as the traffic jams on highways triggered schedule collapse of bus services.
The Dhaka-Tangail highway was the worst.
Mohammad Abdul Baten of Kuril in Dhaka said he with his family started for Tangail from Mohakhali Bus Terminal around 6:00am, but their bus only reached Pakulla in Mirzapur upazila around 12:30pm thanks to traffic jams.
He said the journey usually took two hours, but even after six hours he was still not home.
Abdul Hannan of Kathalbagan, Dhaka, said he along with his eight-member family started their journey at Gabtoli Bus Terminal around 9:00am to go to Pabna, but the bus reached only Elenga in Tangail eight hours later, at 4:00pm.
He said they would not go to their home outside the capital to celebrate Eid anymore. The hassle and sufferings were too much.
Stuck in traffic jams with no food or access to toilets were turning their happier time of the year into nightmares, both of them observed.
Large number of vehicles on the narrow highways was the main reason behind the congestion, said Hayatul Islam, assistant superintendent of police of Tangail.
The ASP also blamed drivers for not following traffic rules and causing the jams. The ASP told The Daily Star that it was not possible for the highway and local police alone to control traffic and that people should cooperate with them.
A bus reached Kurigram in the north yesterday evening at 6:15pm having started from Dhaka at 2:00am. The passengers of the bus, who had to endure a 16-hour journey, felt lucky as another bus which started for Kurigram at 8:00am Tuesday took 20 hours to reach the district.
The journey usually takes about seven hours on a regular day and the delay was due to a 50km-long tailback in Tangail, reports our Tangail and Kurigram correspondents.
Several intercity bus service providers said passengers had to wait hours to get on buses. They said buses were turned around hours late.
A manager of an intercity bus service provider said their buses were leaving Dhaka at least five hours behind schedule as the vehicles were late in arriving from the northern districts.
The manager of a bus service provider in Chittagong said their buses were leaving station at least two hours behind schedule as they failed to reach Chittagong on time for their turnaround.
The manager said it was due to gridlocks in Sitakunda, on Meghna and Gumti bridges, and at Kanchpur on Dhaka-Chittagong highway.
There was a 20km-long tailback stretching from Daudkandi to Gumti-Meghna bridge on Dhaka-Chittagong highway.
Things were not any better for those heading towards the southwest.
Nearly 800 vehicles were stranded at the Mawa ferry terminal and there was a four-km-long queue of vehicles at Paturia ferry terminal in Manikganj waiting to cross the Padma river.
Two additional pontoons at Mawa terminal failed to cope with the pressure of large number of vehicles.
The new pontoons had too narrow approach roads for heavy vehicles and only light vehicles were using them to get on to ferries. Most vehicles using the ferry service there were heavy vehicles.
Sirajul Haque, manager at the Mawa side of the Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Corporation (BIWTC), said they were trying to prepare another pontoon, which might be opened for use tomorrow.
The BIWTC had also declared that it would not ferry trucks for a week from yesterday. Trucks carrying perishable goods and sacrificial animals would, however, be allowed to cross.
Four-km-long queues at Paturia and Daulatdia on the Padma caused untold sufferings to thousands of passengers yesterday.
Many just left their vehicles, crossed the river on small motor launches and caught alternative transports to get home.
Motiur Rahman started for Kushtia from Dhaka at 5:00am in his car.
“I first got stuck in Savar for two hours and then in Manikganj for another couple. Finding no way, I left my car with the driver in Manikganj and got on a rickshawvan to reach Paturia,” he told The Daily Star.
Motiur said he went to Daulatdia by a launch.
Ashrafullah Khan, manager of Paturia side of BIWTC, claimed that the route was completely jam-free in the morning and the congestion began around noon with the increase in the vehicles.
He said a total of nine roll-in-and-roll-out and five K-type ferries were transporting vehicles.
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