Uttara To Motijheel In 30 Minutes: Dhaka metro revolutionises commuting

Traffic war for us is a real deal; any trip to anywhere around the city be it in your own car, public bus, or CNG auto-rickshaw, was nothing less than a two-hour horror tale of heat, dust, sound pollution, suffocation, and tiredness. And finally, when you reach your destination, you are half-dead. Today, I am happy beyond words. My trip to Motijheel was nothing short of a mega triumph.

The spirit of the commuters travelling the 20.1km distance in just half an hour, was exuberant.

Hamid, whose office is in Paltan, got dropped off at Dhaka Secretariat station and was happy that he would not have to face all the haggling and pushing and shoving in his bus rides.

"This mode of transport will help us as we will not miss work. This is for the toiling middle-class, who were hardly considered," Hamid says as he punches his metro pass and zooms off to Paltan.

"I am willing to pay Tk 100 for my commute to work in Motijheel. It is Tk 30 more than my local bus ticket and Tk 50 more than my local train ride to Kamalapur. I am travelling in a clean carriage with air-conditioning and do not have to face lawlessness at traffic signals and the constant honking of the car horns," Nurul Amin, another Uttara resident narrates his first trip to Motijheel.

Huda, on the other hand, went to Motijheel to run a banking errand. He says he started at 8:00am from Uttara North, completed his task, and headed back to his office in Karwan Bazar by 11:00am. He was all glee for such an achievement.

"On other days running this errand would have taken two-thirds of my working hour," he says.

All the commuters were in awe at how much time had been saved from their everyday life, and not to forget the relief from road rage or stress.

Merrily chatting and calculating the pros and cons of Dhaka Metro, people from all walks of life and doing all sorts of jobs and business, concluded that the government has indeed been able to reduce the traffic woes of people.

Each train can run at a speed of 100 to 110km with 2,300 passengers and was full to the brim all the way to Agargoan, however, the opening of the new routes kept the passengers' flow high as most office goers opted for Dhaka Metro on a day when a blockade was on-going.

"Dhaka Metro Motijheel route will run daily from 7:30am to 11:30am until further notice, while it will operate till 8:30pm in the Uttara-Agargaon section. Considering people's convenience, the route was extended by 1.16km from Motijheel to Kamalapur. The extended portion will be completed by June 2024.

"The enthusiasm and the general public put us in a happy place because together we want to build a smart Bangladesh," says Md Aftabuddin Talukder, project director, Dhaka Mass Rapid Transit Development Project (Line-6). The director was personally present at the Motijheel concourse to see to a smooth operation and was amazed to witness the public travel hassle-free.