The Bangladesh Railway (BR) has suspended vehicular movement for three months to renovate the century-old Kalurghat Bridge over the Karnaphuli River in Chattogram to facilitate Dhaka-Cox’s Bazar train service.
The suspension that came into effect on Tuesday also stopped the Demu Train service on the Chattogram-Dohazari route. To facilitate vehicular movement, the Roads and Highways Department (RHD) has started a ferry service as well.
Kalurghat Bridge will be renovated according to suggestions of BUET’s expert team at a cost of Tk 55 crore. For this work, on June 18, BR signed a contract with Max Infrastructure Limited.
Pintu Chakma, executive engineer of RHD Chattogram Division Office, told The Business Post that the ferry service was introduced on July 21. “Two ferries will carry the vehicles to the other side of the river while one will be on standby,” he said.
Visiting the bridge area on Tuesday afternoon, this correspondent saw people travelling from the port city to Boalkhali Upazila walking across the bridge as traffic was stopped while some were using the ferries.
Saddam Hussain, a resident of the Boalkhali area who crossed the bridge on foot, told The Business Post that it will take an hour to cross by ferry while walking takes only 15 minutes.
“Renovating the bridge will not help. People will suffer. A new bridge must be built. There is no alternative,” he said.
Primarily, the bridge, which was built in 1931, will be made fit for train operation with heavy engines and allow the current speed limit of 10 km/h to rise. Trains will use this one until a new bridge is built, said BR Chief Engineer (East) Md Abu Jafor Mia.
Over the years, Kalurghat Bridge underwent repair works several times to keep it functional. “We want to increase the speed limit to 50-60 km/h as well as the loadbearing capacity,” he told The Business Post back in May.
He said they will make the bridge workable first. “We will increase load capacity first. This will be done before September and the rest of the work will be completed within six more months.”
Vehicles have been using the metre-gauge single-line rail bridge as well after it was reconfigured in 1962. This bridge has been repeatedly renovated and maintained with braces.
In 2004, major renovation work was done on this bridge at a cost of Tk 10 crore. At that time, traffic on the bridge was stopped for 11 months.
In 2018, a span was damaged when a ship collided with it. At that time, it was closed for two days and repaired at a cost of Tk 50 lakh. Before this, the bridge was renovated in several phases.
Kalurghat Bridge came into discussion after the government took Chattogram-Dohazari-Cox's Bazar Rail Link Project to operate passenger trains on the Dhaka-Cox's Bazar route. This bridge is a part of the project.
Earlier, Railways Minister Nurul Islam Sujan said that the route will be opened by September and the bridge will not create problems as the renovation work will be completed before trains start operating.
To renovate the old bridge, a BUET expert team was assigned to assess the works to be done. It found that eight of the main 19 spans of the bridge were in very bad condition. It recommended an urgent overhaul and asked the authority to close the bridge during the renovation.
In 2014, the government decided to build a new bridge and decommission the existing one. The initial cost was estimated at Tk 1,163.27 crore. The estimated cost later climbed up to Tk 14,000 crore for changes in designs, repeated feasibility studies and price hikes of construction materials. The construction of the new bridge is expected to be completed by 2028.
