Life in Dhaka can be unbearable due to constant traffic jam on almost every road and street. Everyday we are becoming less productive due to the time we spend on the road, not even mentioning the money wasted on fuel and CNG. During my recent visit to Seoul, the capital of South Korea, I noticed Seoul also has high-rise office buildings and apartments just like in Dhaka but the difference is I did not feel suffocated in Seoul. In Korea one out of three citizens has a car. The situation brings big pressure on the city traffic but I was not feeling it at all unlike what we experience in Dhaka.

As Seoul makes greater efforts in developing its public transportation system, rush-hour traffic jams is becoming a thing of the past. Mass Transport System and Taxi cabs are so efficient that people are encouraged to use buses and taxis (occasionally). The public transportation (buses) can be much faster than the cars because roads have dedicated lane for the buses.

Here is what MrOh Se-Hoon, the Mayor of South Korea, said.

“Constructing more roads doesn’t work in dealing with the traffic problems, developing public transportation is the only solution.”

According to the Mayor, the city has put more efforts in improving the buses compared with extending the subway. The bus routes cover almost every street. There are designated bus lanes. During rush hour, people save time traveling by bus.

The Seoul city started to improve its public transportation since 2004, with an investment of USD 100 million. Between the bus system and the subway, Seoul opted for the bus system as the urgent priority, because greater impact of the bus system is evident with the same amount of investment.

Lee Manki from the Seoul Transport Operation and Information Service Center says it costs USD 80 million to construct every 100 meters of subway. They have, however only spent USD 100 million on the bus system over the past six years, but have seen very effective result in reducing traffic jam to a tolerable level.

He says, the Transport Operation and Information Service Center can monitor more than 700 traffic cameras in Seoul. If any traffic accident occurs, police and ambulance will be deployed at the site in three minutes. Moreover, about 8,000 buses in the city have been equipped with GPS, so that the speed of these buses can be monitored in real time. With this data, the center can adjust the traffic lights in accordance with the traffic flow.

Apart from these efforts, the city has taken other measures to improve traffic. To encourage more young people to commute by bus, many bus cards are made into the shape of cartoon figures.

If people do not want to use this bus card, they can pay for the bus tickets with their credit cards. Here is Oh Se-Hoon again:

“What Seoul has been doing is to extend the public transportation system, including buses and subway. The prices of Mass Transportation System are very low. With only 1 US dollar, people can travel around the Central Business District area in the city, and this is the lowest price among all the countries of the developed world.”Although traffic police can be rarely seen on the road, most drivers insist on obeying the traffic rules, since nearly all roads are under surveillance by cameras. Offices use car lift parking system to complement the large parking lots. On the road I did not see even a single illegally parked vehicle.

What can we learn from this effective model in Seoul to solve our own unbearable traffic problem?

1. All commercial and private apartment buildings should use car lift system for maximum utilisation of the space. Instead of using the traditional basement car park system, if a car lift system is used, the number of car spaces can be doubled or tripled.

2. Large 1000 car multistory car parks have to be constructed in: Gulshan-1 (at least 1), Gulshan-2 (at least 1), Banani (at least 1), Dhanmondi (at least 3), Mirpur (at least 3), Uttara (at least 3) Elephant Road (at least 1), New Market (at least 1), Shahbagh (at least 1), Moghbazar (at least 1), Motijheel (at least 2)

3. Dhaka Metropolitan City has to be brought under surveillance system. Any car parked illegally has to get an automatic ticket when the surveillance camera will detect a car parked on any street. The software system will issue the ticket automatically without any human involvement.

4. New light weight buses made by Daewoo, TATA and other companies should be allowed within the Dhaka Metropolitan City. The heavy buses which have a huge luggage compartment in the belly should not be allowed to plough within the Dhaka Metropolitan City. And number of new buses should be increased by thousands through Public-Private Partnership initiative and all the old buses have to be taken out from the road.

5. All bus drivers should have at least 10 years of driving experience and clean driving record. At least 25% of the bus drivers have to be women.

6.  Illegally parked cars on any street have to be towed. Proceeds earned from the illegally parked vehicles should be spent on keeping the footpath clean.

7. The traffic control system should be fully automated and monitored 24X7 to avoid traffic violation and smooth traffic flow.

8. In the long term over-passes and under-passes have to be built for uninterrupted traffic flow.

9. Scope of the Metro Rail project has to be increased manifold over the course of next two decades so that the city’s organic growth can be handled through capacity building.

We must do something before we choke our city to death.

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Tanvir Raquib is the Executive Director of Good HEAL Trust.