The Dhaka-Chattogram expressway project in the country's prime corridor has been shelved again even after completing necessary preparatory work involving Tk 970 million in last six years.
Sources said Roads and Highways Department (RHD) has dropped the public-private partnership (PPP) project from its list of yearly projects even though it completed detailed design after finding a corridor feasible for establishing the controlled-access highway.
They said the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) directed the department to go slow with the US$ 4.14-billion project as the Prime Minister has given her consent to development of high-speed railway in the Dhaka-Chattogram corridor instead of establishment of an expressway.
She has given priority to building high-speed railway as the existing Dhaka-Chattogram highway is now functioning well after widening work recently, sources said.
Another source said the PM's directive to stop implementing the expressway project was given to overlap with the high-speed train network as it will have to use the same route of expressway up to Cumilla from Dhaka.
The RHD took the initiative to develop a 214-kilometre expressway in 2013, taking into account huge traffic on the corridor due to its location between the capital Dhaka and port city of Chattogram.
It later took loan amounting to Tk 690 million from the Asian Development Bank to carry out a feasibility study and detailed design work under a technical project which concluded last year.
According to the project office, RHD is now preparing tender document with financial support of PPP Authority to select concessionaire for the construction of the expressway.
According to the plan, entire 218-kilometre highway would have both surface and elevated road with seven interchanges to ensure 100km speed of vehicles for reaching end destinations in two hours.
At detailed design stage in 2016, the RHD project was first halted for one and a half years after Bangladesh Bridges Authority (BBA) placed a proposal to develop entire 200-kilometre expressway in elevated way with the provision of high-speed train.
Though detailed design of the proposed alignment was carried out on approval from the Prime Minister, she, however, signed the BBA proposal to carry out the feasibility study on elevated expressway with high-speed train.
The RHD project faced another blow when the finance ministry rejected it on the grounds that there was no need of the scheme just after the Dhaka-Chattogram four-lane project was completed.
Engineers and experts said the demand for controlled- access highway on the country's economic corridor would not fade away with setting up of high-speed train or expansion of existing highway corridor.
They said this is right time to start the work of expressway to cope with increasing traffic on the corridor known as the economic lifeline due to its connectivity with the port city and its location in between Asian Highway.
According to sources, the Dhaka-Chattogram highway was used by 35,000 vehicles daily in 2012 when the expressway was planned.
They said traffic flow on the highway has now increased three times. The capacity of the existing highway would be lost by 2025 if necessary steps are not taken by the authority concerned.
More than 90 per cent of goods are transported through the Dhaka-Chattogram corridor.
ASM Elias Shah, director of the Dhaka-Chattogram expressway project, told the FE that they are still continuing with the work.
"The PPP project is always slow project. But it is still on the track," he added.
