Reviving the railway for sustainable and safe travel: a study of the Dhaka-Narayanganj railway route

Abstract

Narayanganj is an industrial and a commercial hub of Bangladesh. It is a rapidly growing urban centre. People’s concentration is increasing due to its being one of the most industrialized zones and having better communication with Dhaka. The transport system of Bangladesh consists of roads, railways, waterways and aviations and the two most dominant land transport modes are Railway and Bus. Narayanganj-Dhaka route is very important for trade, commerce and industry. In this route bus service is more prominent. But bus service has a lot of shortcomings in Dhaka. Too many buses on the street create traffic jam, pollution, accident and so on. The railway has been a very popular mode in the past, but its popularity declined or was made to decline due to various reasons. Railway, as a mass transport mode, has increased all over the world; the opposite seems to be true in the case of Bangladesh, especially Dhaka. And, this calls for an investigation as to why this is so. Thus, the specific aims of this research were (i) to investigate into the problems that has rendered the railway inefficient and unreliable over time and (ii) how this can be reversed and to investigate why passengers traveling from Dhaka to Narayanganj or vice versa ride buses and whether they will travel by railway if reliability and efficiency of this services are ensured. This study revealed that train service is much better than bus service and also more reliable. The research also has pointed out comparative benefits and problems of train service. In addition, a set of recommendation has been suggested to popularize the train service. The policy recommendations that are provided in this thesis can be taken into consideration for preparing future development plan in this regard.