Provision of bus bay near bus-stops to reduce traffic congestion in Dhaka city using GIS

Abstract

Mega city Dhaka is confronted with the management of serious traffic congestion. The provision for bus bay can be considered as a significant measure to improve the overall traffic congestion. Evidently, at most bus stops in Dhaka city there is no provision for bus bays for boarding and alighting passengers. Surprisingly, all are done on the main streets and other vehicles have to wait which leads to congestion, and passengers have to wait on the street for buses taking risk of life.Wrongly planned bus stops and absence of bus-bays in particular at busy locations are two major factors behind the nagging traffic congest. In Dhaka, buses are the major mode of transport, the choice for the majority of community and are the only means of mobility that can be affordable by the urban poor. Due to absence of fixed point of picking up or dropping passengers, unlimited bus stopping time at bus stops, boarding and aligning in the middle of the road traffic congestion is encouraged and safety of the passengers is falling down. There were only five or six bus bays constructed by Roads and Highway Department (RHD) at some traffic points in the city in 2004 but these are not planned appropriately considering the huge number of buses going through the bus stops every minute. In this context, this study attempts to provide provision of efficient bus bay near busstops for reducing traffic congestion in Dhaka city with the help of GIS. Mirpur-10 bus stop, Mirpur-1 bus stop, Mohakhali bus stop, Gulshan-1 bus stop and Nilkhet bus stop were considered as a case study. These areas were selected as these are the busiest areas in Dhaka city, haphazard stopping of buses on the streets and blocking traffic stream is very common and there is no provision for boarding and alighting passengers. To achieve the objectives existing condition of the study area and three types of survey were conducted.Classified traffic volume counts were done by manual counting method to determine the number of traffic and volume of bus during peak hour traffic volume at the selected bus stops. A structured both end questionnaires was designed to explore the passenger opinions for bus bay, passenger journeys by public bus, number of journey in a day, passengers’ problems facing during peaking and dropping etc. The boarding passengers were surveyed. Previous accident data was collected from Accident Research Institute (ARI), BUET. The best suitable site for a bus bay provision near the bus stop area was identified using buffer, erase, multiple to single part tool of GIS.GIS also used to generate demonstrated traffic survey data, measuring ROW width simply and easily. Identification of the optimal location of the bus stop, minimum distance from the intersections and general intersection, availability of require length in selecting suitable site for bus bay provision was conducted employing GIS technique. From observation study, it was found actual ROW is not used for the actual purposes and encroachment prevails everywhere. About 80% users in Mirpur-1, 95% in Mirpur 10, 60% in Mohakhali and 90% in Nilkhetdemands bus bay in the bus stops. Gulshan-1 bus stop was found locating within 75 m from the intersection. Mirpur-10 bus stop, Nilkhet bus stop, Mirpur-1 bus stop are within the coverage area of small intersections. Only Mohakhali bus stop location was found in the right place. At each of the bus stops boarding frequency is significantly high more than about 40. The highest average bus volume was found to be 644.5 at Mirpur-1 bus stop area.The study found provision of a bus bay is possibleat almost all the bus stop.Construction of a bus bay can be planned at Mohakhali bus stop if the elimination of encroachment is done and the garbageis removed. Mirpur-1 bus stop,Nilkhet bus stop, Gulshan-1 bus stop and Mirpur-10 bus are required to relocate for constructing a bus stop at most suitable site considering availability of space and proximity to the nearest intersection.There might need to acquire the land and change the landuse to provide a bus bay at the most suitable location in Mirpur-10 and Gulshan-1 bus stop areas for future betterment of traffic congestion As there is no study has been conducted concentrating on bus bay provision at bus stops the outcome of this research might be helpful to study the scope of a bus bay provision at other bus stops in Dhaka city for immediate construction now or in near future. In addition, planner should consider the bus bay provision in locating new bus stops. This study thus serves as useful strategic tools to implement bus bay in transportation planning and thereby the decision makers can escalate bus bay provision. It can also possible to identify the scope of bus bay provision in other busiest bus stops in Dhaka city.