Trip back to Dhaka turns bitter

Thousands of people suffered for hours in tailbacks on Bangabandhu bridge link road in Tangail for the fourth straight day yesterday.

Moreover, two crashes in Mirzapur created gridlock on Dhaka-Tangail highway that lasted almost throughout the day.

On the Bangabandhu bridge link road, the tailbacks that began Friday morning were not cleared even at night.

Garment worker Bilkis Akter, who was returning to work in Dhaka with her son, said her child suffered a lot in the heat without food and water as her bus remained stuck in Elenga, Tangail, for hours.

Highway police said there were too many vehicles on the road as people were heading back to Dhaka from the northern districts after Eid vacation. Besides, crashes and vehicles breaking down on the road created major bottlenecks on the narrow link road.

Contacted, officials at Bangabandhu Bridge Traffic Control Room said the traffic was so heavy that even diverting some of the Dhaka-bound vehicles to Bhuapur link road couldn't ease congestion between the eastern side of the bridge and Elenga, Tangail.

Ataur Rahman, in-charge of Elenga Highway Police Outpost, said, "Motorists entering the two-lane link road from the four-lane Dhaka-Tangail highway face major bottlenecks."

He added that the narrow stretch of the road was a major cause for tailbacks.

On Dhaka-Tangail highway in Dulla Mansur area of Mirzapur, a major crash involving a bus and truck around 4:30am kept the road almost blocked until 7:15am when the totaled vehicles were towed away.

But the tailbacks reached miles in the meantime.

Before traffic flow could become normal, a woman and two children were crushed to death by a bus around at 11:45am near Pakulla Bus Stand, which is a few kilometres away from Dulla Mansur area.

Locals kept the road blocked soon afterwards and vehicles could not begin to move before 2:00pm, police said.

Congestion on the highway persisted until the evening.