Staff Reporter:
A view-exchange meeting on ‘Bus Route Rationalization’ yesterday decided to remove over 1,000 buses currently operating without valid fitness certificates on Dhaka’s streets in the earliest possible time.
The Dhaka Transport Coordination Authority (DTCA) held the meeting at its conference room and dis-cussed several key issues and took a number of important decisions.
Executive director of DTCA Mohammad Mashiur Rahman presided over the meeting while chief coor-dinator of Transport Owners-Workers United Alliance lawmaker Advocate Shamsur Rahman Shimul Biswas spoke as the chief guest.
The meeting decided that steps would be taken to cancel all inoperative bus routes in the metropolitan area.
The meeting said that currently there were 418 approved bus routes, while a DTCA survey identified that only 98 routes are in operation.
Necessary measures will be taken regarding the remaining inactive routes, the DTCA meeting said.
It said some 60 bus routes are sufficient to meet the commuters’ demand in the capital while consensus was reached on 32 routes. Decision on remaining routes will be finalized shortly.
Following the finalization of the route list, the DTCA will take the decision regarding which company will operate buses on which route.
Under the proposed system, only one company will be allowed to operate on a single route.
The number of buses on each route will be fixed, and operations will commence only after verifying fitness certificates and all other required documents and compliance requirements of the buses, it said.
Stakeholders of various transport routes of the capital were present at the meeting.
