Editorial
Homebound journeys
Frightening tailbacks as usual
With Eid-ul-Azha approaching, thousands of outbound passengers hoping to celebrate it with their loved ones in home districts are spending hours stuck on highways leading out of Dhaka. One of the main culprits is the Dhaka-bound trucks and other transports laden with sacrificial animals. To add salt to injury, the setting up of both authorized and unauthorized animal markets all over the place is having a detrimental effect on vehicular movement. The situation is not much better on river routes. Going by newspaper reports, launches are overloaded with people and baggage.
But the situation on the highways is particularly deplorable. Going by newspaper reports, a 30km tailback was created on the Dhaka-Tangail and Mymensingh road when a truck experienced engine trouble. On the Kaliakoir-Chandra crossroads, traffic can be seen for miles on any of the three roads that converge there. All this is causing untold suffering for passengers as travel times are nearly doubled.
What is apparent is that every year we see the same scenario ahead of or in the immediate aftermath of Eid. It is expected that vehicles will either derail or stop functioning on the roads. Why then cannot road transport authorities have sufficient vehicle-removal equipment stationed on some key roads leading out of the city? Why must thousands of passengers suffer the same fate on the roads because authorities fail to predict the predictable? A few simple measures taken ahead of time could reduce the sufferings of the huge multitude of people who move out of the city every year.
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