CE-451

Transportation Engineering – II
Assignment
On

“Road maintenance challenges in Bangladesh”

Rezvi Ahmed
201711034
CE-19
Section-B
In recent times road networks in Bangladesh are expanding
much faster than corresponding increases in maintenance
budgets and institutional capacities. The importance of road
maintenance lies mainly in the need to protect the substantial
investment that has been made on highways. Furthermore, the
significance of the maintenance function is seen in the vital need
to continue the economic and social benefits that are derived
from the public road system.

Classification of road maintenance:

• Routine maintenance: Ii embraces work items such as
filling of potholes and repairing ofcracks which are
required to be carried out by the maintenance staff almost
round the year.
• Periodic maintenance: It covers more extensive
maintenance operations such as applying a seal or renewal
coat which are required to be done periodically every few
years.
• Rehabilitative maintenance: Operations required to bring a
deteriorated road upto the original standard. In a perfectly
maintained road there should not be any rehabilitative
maintenance as it’s more expensive than other
maintenances.
• Improvements: minor improvements, widening etc. which
are too small to involve a construction unit.
 • Emergency maintenance: Repairs required immediately to
restore communication.

The main reasons for maintaining a road are:

• To prolong the life of the road.
• To reduce vehicle operating costs.
• To keep the road serviceable.
• To ensuring road safety.

Road maintenance challenges in Bangladesh:

▪ Problems for arrangement of traffic: Since the
maintenance operation involve considerable hardship,
inconvenience and hazard to traffic and also hazards to
maintenance workmen all possible precautions should be
taken to make safe arrangements for traffic. These include
erection of barriers, signs, red flags and traffic. The
maintenance locations are surrounded by white and ed
stripped barriers, fences and directional cones to guide the
approaching vehicles onto another line. Efforts should be
made to confine work in half the pavement width at a
time, leavung the other half for use byb the traffic.
Selecting and positioning temporary road signs, the
followings principles should be applied-
▪ Traffic control devices must always be in a good and
usable condition.
▪ Traffic control devices must always be visible.
▪ Traffic control devices must be correctly located.
 ▪ Traffic control devices must be properly mounted and
fixed and must possess adequate stability.

Al temporary signs must be removed a soon as the work they

relate to complete. It includes-
o Clean tools
o Load all tools, equipment and reusable materials on to truck.
o Collect all traffic warning signs and cones, wipe clean and
load onto truck, stacking them carefully.
o Check that nothing has been left behind that the site is clean
and neat.

NRSC and Road Safety

The Current Situation
➢ In Bangladesh the reported road
accident fatalities have doubled in the last
three years. At 58 deaths per 10,000
vehicles, the fatality rate is now one of the
highest in the world. This level of road
deaths is unacceptably high and can be seen
in the comparison chart below to be
considerably higher than that of
industrialised countries and to be noticeably
higher than most of the other developing
countries in this part of the world.
➢ Many of those killed were family
breadwinners and many were children. In
addition to the pain and suffering caused by
these accidents they represent a significant
drain on the Bangladesh economy. As well
as those killed, many more are seriously
injured and will suffer the consequences of
their accidents for the rest of their lives.
➢ There are numerous reasons why
there are so many road accidents in
Bangladesh. More and more vehicles - are
using the roads and between 1971 and 1997
motor vehicles increased steadily from
40,000 to 460,000. This, combined with
rapid urbanisation, has seen the road
accident casualty and fatality rates rise
dramatically. Inadequate treatment of
casualties, poor driver discipline, poor
road-worthiness of many vehicles, and
ineffectual legislation and enforcement
practices are just some of the reasons which
are regularly cited. Other contributing
factors include adverse roadside
environments, excessive speeding and the
reckless behaviour of some road users.
➢ It is now accepted that without
urgent action accident levels will grow
even further. In both social and economic
terms these are costs that the country can
ill-afford to bear.
➢ In response to the growing road
safety problem the National Road Safety
Council was formed in 1995. The NRSC,
under the chairmanship of the Minister of
Communications and consisting of senior
Government officers and representatives of
the other key concerned agencies, was
assigned the responsibility for formulating
national road safety policies with the goal
of reducing road traffic accidents.

Maintenance work can be divided in the following four

categories from the point of view of safety and traffic control:
o Repairing the edges of the carriageway, shoulders, cleaning
out drains, cutting grass etc. where carriageway in not affected.
o Repairing the carriageway restricting to one lane while
traffic can be allowed on the other lane.
o While working on the center line such as center line marking
to restricted width on either side.
o Total closure of the road necessitating use of diversion due
to widening/reconstruction of an existing road.
▪ Works on edge and shoulders: Before starting the work, all
warning signs should be installed. When the work in
completed then thse signs should be removed in the
reverse order.
▪ Restricting the traffic to one lane: At times, the traffic is to
be restricted to one lane only due to repairs being carried
out in the order lane such as major patch repairs etc.
‘Men at work’ sign to be put up 200m before commencement
of the work.
o ‘Narrow road ahead’ should be at 100m ahead of work area.
o ‘Keep left/right’ sign to be places at the commencement point
of the work and next to the barriers on the either end of the
work area.
o ‘Barriers’ should be places on both side os the work area.
o ‘Restricted ends’ signs should be installed 200m beyond the
work area.

➢ Working in the center of carriageway: While working in

the center of carriageway , adequate attention has to be
paid from the safety point of view. Except in this case, the
vehicles will keep only to the left in each direction.
➢ Financial capacity: The capacity to pay for road
maintenance from domestic sources depends on a
country resources. Gross National Product (GNP) per
capita may thus be a good index for financial capacity, but
some governments are able to capture more of it than
others. And of the fiscal intake, the allocation to highways
is a political e decision about national priorities.
➢ Instituional capacity: The difference in gross national
product (GNP) per capita anf its rate of change, the ratio
of network length to GNP, the age distribution of roads
and the volumes of traffic – do not fully account fot the
variation in road conditions from country to country.
Institutional capacity has several facts. One is the size of
labour force that can be applied to the activity. Others are
the soundness of maintenance strategy – type , level and
timing of intervention and the managerial and operation
efficiency with which the strategy is executed. This
depend, in turn, on such factors as governmental
commitment, institutional structure, managerial ability,
staff quality, accountability and incentives.
 Rural Road Maintenance Financing:
➢ Financing from Revenue Budget .
➢ Financing through Development projects by foreign
assistances or Government Development program.
➢ Block allocation to Local Government Institutions like
Union Parishads or Upazila Parishads or Zila Parishads.
➢ PBMC by foreign assistance program.
➢ Rural Road Maintenance Fund is ¼ of Rural Road
Construction Cost.
➢ Almost 1% Cost is used in terms of Asset Value.

Recommendations:

• Before going for maintenance work, evaluation for road

condition should be done properly. Quality control for
maintenance materials must be assured.
• Fund requirement for proper and timely maintenance
must be estimated by the concerned organizations in
appropriate time. Sufficient fund for maintenance to be
assured.
• Department and organization which are responsible for
maintaining the road must chalk out a program of road
maintenance at the end of the year. This must be placed
to the appropriate authority so that allocation of funds
can give as per requirement.
 • Departments and organizations concerned with road
maintenance works should take steps to acquire
number of equipments and machineries in order to
undertake maintenance works speedily and effectively.
• Upazilla connceting roads must be considered for
maintenance and accordingly allotment should be given.

Link to the References:

http://www.rhd.gov.bd/Documents/RHDPublications/RoadsInBangladesh/Glossy
_19

https://www.adb.org/sites/default/files/in435-14

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/334372785_SAFER_ROAD_INFRASTRU
CTURE_FOR_SUSTAINABLE_TRANSPORT_DEVELOPMENT_IN_BANGLADESH

http://lib.buet.ac.bd/home/?q=node/6