No maintenance puts major bridges at risks
No periodical maintenance of major bridges and infrastructures has reduced the longevity putting at risks important bridges such as Jamuna, Meghna and Kanchpur bridges and other structures such as highways, experts said.
Experts also said that successive governments had not ensured periodical maintenance of the infrastructures only because projects funded by donors could be initiated whenever the structures would be at risk.
The poor condition of the Kanchpur, Meghna and Meghna-Gumti bridges for lack of maintenance has compelled the government to speed up efforts to build three bridges alongside the old ones to ensure uninterrupted traffic on the Dhaka–Chittagong Highway.
On the other hand, lack of initiatives to repair the cracks in the Bangabandhu Bridge that were detected five years ago has widened the cracks, threatening the life-span of the bridge and its load capacity.
'Yes, of course, lack of maintenance reduces the longevity of infrastructures such as bridges and highways and put them at risk,' Jamilur Reza Choudhury, who headed the first investigation team for the Bangabandhu Bridge, told New Age on Saturday.
Jamilur Reza said that engineers at the time of sketching the design of a bridge or an infrastructure give a time line of when what kind of maintenance of the infrastructure should be carried out.'Certain maintenance work is needed to be carried out at certain intervals and if the maintenance work mentioned by the engineers concerned is not carried out in time, the infrastructure loses its lifespan,' Choudhury opined.'The present condition of the Meghna Bridge shows what can happen if the maintenance work is not carried out in time,' he said.
The Meghna Bridge is under a threat as riverbed scouring has made several piers vulnerable while a high traffic volume and overloaded trucks are damaging the deck prompting the authorities to operate ferry services for heavy vehicles to reduce pressure on the bridge.
Experts who surveyed the bridge called for immediate repairs. The Meghna Bridge is crucial to smooth road communications between Dhaka and Chittagong.Jamilur Reza, involved with different big projects of the government including the proposed Padma Bridge, said that governments often remained apathetic to disbursement of and looked towards foreign funds for repairs of the infrastructures at one go.
In reference to the Meghna Bridge, the authorities' pre-emptive measures could have easily stopped the bridge from running into the situation it is today.Roads and Highways Department engineers believe that the scouring of the riverbed could have been the result of large vessels plying underneath.
Former vice-chancellor of Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology AMM Shafiullah said, 'Fast water flow has caused the scouring. The RHD should have monitored the bridge and resolved all the problems.'Retired additional chief engineer of the Roads and Highways Department MA Muqtadir Belal, who was the project director of the Bhairab Bridge, also echoed wbat Jamilur Reza said, saying that the maintenance work was carried out in such as way for any of the big bridges.
He said that bathymetric surveus should be conducted every 15 days to get a detailed topographic data of the riverbed and riverbanks for every bridge.'But, as far as I know, such a survey has been not been conducted for any of the bridges,' said Muqtadir, also the managing director of Structural Services Limited.
At the time of construction of the Bhairab Bridge, 'We appointed a joint-venture company, Sigma-RCL, to operate and maintain the bridges apart from toll collection.'But such a mechanism does not exist in the case of other bridges, he added.
RHD executive director Abdullah Al Mamun said there were many reasons for lack of maintenance work of the bridges. He, however, declined to give the details.
It has become essential to build three bridges as trouble with any of the existing bridges will severely hamper transport of goods through the country's busiest highway, communications ministry officials said.
The communications minister, Obaidul Quader, recently visited the three bridges and said that they were risky. He directed RHD officials to repair the bridges immediately to ensure uninterrupted vehicle movement on the highway.
Construction of three bridges with four lanes will require an estimated Tk 2,500 crore. The one alongside the Kanchpur Bridge will cost about Tk 900 crore, the new Meghna Bridge nearly Tk 830 crore and the new Meghna-Gumti bridge about Tk 700 crore.The bridges will be constructed under three projects that will include renovation of the three old bridges, ministry officials said.
The Japan International Cooperation Agency has showed interest in financing the projects, they said.'A JICA team arrived in Dhaka on December 26, 2011 and the team is conducting a study on the Kanchpur and Meghna-Gumti bridges,' said Shahanuddin Khan, superintending engineer of the Roads and Highways Department (Dhaka Circle).He said that the communications ministry had requested JICA to finance also the new Meghna Bridge.
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