Dhaka Chittagong Highway
Dhaka Chittagong Highway, N01 Connects the capital city Dhaka with the port city Chittagong. This road connects Chittagong, Chittagong Hill Tracks and Cox’s Bazar with the rest of the country. N01 is also part of Asia Highway 41 and SASEC corridor. Chittagong Port which handles 92% of the country’s import and export and 98% of the country’s container trade spreads and deliver its services throughout this road. In last fiscal year 2021-2022 Chittagong Port handled 3.4 million TEU’s ( twenty-foot equivalent unit ) container. Which is more than the port’s current capacity 3.2 million. Within 2031 Bangladesh’s container trade will increase to 5 million TEU’s. Matarbari port and Chittagong Port’s Bay terminal will be operational around 2026-2028. When all of these ports will be inaugurated there is a big possibility that China, India, Nepal, Bhutan, Myanmar and even Pakistan would want to use these ports in varies way.
Currently Bangladesh Railway handles only 4%
of the container trade which happens through Chittagong port, 1% of the
container transported via waterways and 95% by Chittagong Dhaka Highway.
Railway currently neither have any infrastructure nor rolling stock to take
more loads. So, in the upcoming years this 4-lane road will have to take most
of the load. On the other hand, N1 also connects Cox’s Bazar and Chittagong
Hill Tracks with the rest of the country which are the main tourist destinations of the country. 27% people
use Railway and 8% Air to travel to Chittagong. Rest of the people uses this
road to travel. Among them 53% travels through Buses.
For all these reasons N01 always face heavy
traffic. A Research by Md. Zia Uddin and Takeshi Mizunoya on “An economic
analysis of the proposed Dhaka–Chittagong Expressway in Bangladesh with the
viewpoint of GHG emission reduction” finds out that daily average traffic on
N01 is 27,334 vehicles/day (in 2022). A survey
by BRTA in 2019 estimated that in 2022 N01’s traffic will be 26,000
vehicles/day. JICA’s survey team estimated (in 2016) that in 2026 this road will have 22,075
vehicles/day. This survey was done in 2016. So, it’s clear that National Highway 01 is getting more
traffic than estimated and its increasing rapidly. As the trade of the country
is expanding this road will get more traffic by time. This road is also the
gateway of Comilla, Chandpur, Noakhali and other districts. Their traffic also
makes this road busier. As the railway is unable to take more load on both cargo
and passenger N01’s pressure will increase.
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Dhaka-Chittagong Highway's Condition |
So, it’s clear that an
expansion or a new road is really needed to cope the traffic demand. Though
there was multiple plans for this, no projects has been taken. Due to U turns
and heavy traffic average speed on this road is 55km/h for buses and 40 km/h
for trucks. Keep this in mind govt wanted to make a 6-lane u turn less
expressway beside the current road. Peaceability study and deign was done and
ADB wanted to finance the project. But government suddenly changed their mind
and wanted to make a new highspeed rail network between Dhaka-Chittagong. The
project would cost 11 billion dollars and China wanted to give a loan for the
project. Government couldn’t afford two such big projects so they suspend the
expressway. But the Highspeed railway project was too big and in the long run
return from it couldn’t pay the loan with interest and also making the economy
vulnerable. That’s why Government shut down this project too. So, what happened
is that in last 4 years traffic on Dhaka-Chittagong route increased but the
roads and railways stayed as it was.
Dhaka-Chittagong Highway
is the life line of the country’s economy. Mohammad Mahfuzul
Hoque Secretary General of FBCCI recently said that due to the slow speed and
heavy traffic of this road cost of every product increases 1-3%. And if any
accident happens the roads faces heavy traffic jams that takes hours to
recover. The road wasn’t meant to bear Heavy loads. But as this road is the
main corridor of import and export, heavy duty vehicle is common here. That’s
why the roads condition is getting worst day by day.
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