Traffic jam and rickshaws
After a brief lull, the call for the total ban on rickshaws is once again being resurrected, this time in DS of 20 March by a resident of Uttara. May I therefore, for his education, repeat the actual facts, why this is not possible.
Is he not aware that Dhaka has only 7% roads instead of a minimum of 25% for any self-respecting metropolis, and these too are in deplorable condition? There are more motorized vehicles (3-4 lakh +) than rickshaws (3 lakh ). Into the motorized category fall private cars, buses and minibuses, CNGs. Only a privileged minority (1-2 %) own cars (but occupy 75% of the roads with their empty/half-empty cars)), perhaps another 30-35% have the physical ability to use the ramshackle, tortuously designed, ancient buses, minibuses and haulers running only on trunk routes. Maybe 10-15% are lucky to be able to hire and to afford the arrogant CNGs. This leaves a vast majority (approx 50%) of the elderly, women, children, disabled, sick, infirm and people carrying small loads, of the middle and lower classes that totally depend on rickshaws for their mobility ( door to door journeys). Yet it is this cheap, easily available, environmentally friendly and productive segment that has been totally blamed for the traffic jams and banned from many main roads. WHAT SORT OF DEMOCRACY IS THIS?
We cannot even think of banning rickshaws until a suitable, cheap, fast (yes, fast), environmentally friendly means of transport is available for about 50-60 lakh people who use rickshaws daily for their only means of transportation in Dhaka. Rickshaws also provide a livelihood for about 20-25 lakh rickshaw related people pumping in about Tk.10 crore into the GDP EVERY DAY. Compare this with the fleet of mostly empty Gas Guzzling Monstrosities (GGMs) that I see every day from my office window illegally parking on the road while queuing up in front of an up-market bakery to maybe buy just a loaf of bread. Good Heavens, that loaf must eventually be costing more than Tk.500 a piece, but then, who cares because surely somebody else is footing the bill.
Rickshaw design has not changed in a century. It is time it was, with its centre of gravity lower than at present. 1) Solar powered, 2) with storage batteries and gears or 3) even with small engines, the rickshaw can still fill the void till we have a mass transit system.
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