Does Dhaka city respect your right to walk?

A few days ago, I was startled by a distressing scream. An agonising  shriek of a young girl who had been struck by a motorised rickshaw right in front of my house. The girl was merely walking along the street when her scarf became entangled in the fast-moving rickshaw, causing her to fall to the ground with the scarf tightly muffled around her neck. 

Shockingly, the rickshaw driver did not bother to stop or look backwards. And the injured girl was lying on the ground, writhing in pain. Unfortunately, this seems to be an all-too-familiar story for residents of our city. Can anyone claim to have walked the streets of Dhaka without encountering a close call with a rickshaw or another vehicle? Who should be held responsible for such accidents, and why is there such a scarcity of pedestrian-friendly spaces?

I reside in a modest neighbourhood situated next to one of Dhaka city's most traffic-congested areas, Bijoy Sharani. Here, the streets are perpetually buzzing like bees, with children playing, hawkers vending vegetables, rickshaw pullers engaged in disputes, and vehicles incessantly honking and speeding by. The street is the heartbeat of this community; however, there is no sidewalk.

Dhaka is a magical city where wonders happen only in the most absurd ways. For too long, scholars, architects, activists, citizens, and many others have asked for the walkability of this city.

This neighbourhood, with mostly 2-3 storied buildings, often reminds me of Venice Island, where I happened to have resided for 2 years. However, the glaring contrast between the two places are that one is full of vehicles, predominantly motorised, and the other has vehicles but is only available to use on the waterways. People walk in Venice with peace while in Dhaka, with panic.

Like this neighbourhood, many other neighbourhoods do not have designated walkways, whereas the streets are dominated by motorised vehicles. This happens on a small-scale street, but the scenario worsens when moving to the main roads. 

Let's consider the footpath of Bijoy Sharani, for example. Both sides and the footpath of roads are cramped illegally with various activities. The traffic signal here works peculiarly. Rarely does the traffic get to move, and when it does, there is no speed limit. Therefore, small vehicles often use the pavement as a shortcut. The walkways in this city are not only for pedestrians but have now become a popular way for small vehicles to be used illegally. Unfortunately, pedestrians suffer as they cannot get down on the road or walk on the designated sidewalks. 

Even so, they manage to walk in between with extreme caution to avoid getting hurt by the miserable condition of the footpath or relying on the mercy of bikers and rickshaw pullers. It is expected to see a bike suddenly come from the back and scream at you, "Move, move," with a peevish look! In addition, unauthorised occupation of footpaths with loose cables, drain water, gates of the buildings, ramps, car parking, vegetable sellers, tea stalls, etc., is recurrent.

 It seems that Dhaka's sidewalks are for everything but walking.

Thanks to this haphazard and chaotic traffic, we have become uniquely adept at multitasking.   Navigating the chaotic traffic in Bangladesh while on foot must have altered our brains. While crossing a road, you can't predict from which direction a vehicle may come. It's like a game, where no one is bothered to follow the rules if they can reach their destination. 

We feel we've achieved the impossible by crossing a road amongst this chaos. Even though it sounds thrilling, the reality is far grimmer. If this continues, in the evolution of humanity, we may eventually develop the ability to turn our heads 360 degrees. Jokes apart, we do have foot-over bridges and zebra crossings. Mostly, the zebra crossings are covered by vehicles. So they are almost invisible, or there are no colours to identify if there is one. On the other hand, the foot-over bridges are dark and scary, full of street vendors. Sometimes, they are located so far away that we prefer to cross directly if there is a little gap in the road divider. However, even the road dividers are not designed well for crossing.

Imagine a hypothetical Dhaka metropolitan area where the footpaths are wide, where we can walk without fear for at least a few kilometres every day, where a blind person can walk alone, where a wheelchair can move smoothly, where kids can walk without their parents holding their hands, and where women feel safe to walk alone even at night. What if we could live in this imaginary city? By walking more and using fewer motorised vehicles, we could improve our health, save money and fuel, and solve the burning issue of car parking. This would have a domino effect, as buying new cars and importing cars would reduce, resulting in less traffic and less pollution. As our health improves, there is less need to see a doctor every few days, thus reducing the use of medication and medical services. It saves our time, environment, and health and prevents unprecedented accidents and death. In a city like this, flyovers and expressways may become obsolete in a few years and be converted into green parks, art galleries, or breathing space for the town. 

Unfortunately, creating this walkable city could cause a decline in our economic growth right now if we are looking for immediate progress. However, there are a thousand examples around the world where cities have learned from their mistakes and succeeded in converting into more livable cities from overly motorised ones, which is also economically viable.

To make Dhaka a more walkable city, we need intelligent solutions that address various issues. When we think of a solution, we cannot just remove the current street life. We should think about all those street activities and the people making a living out of them together. To guide the illegal use of footpaths by bikes and rickshaws, we can install bollards or design a layer of hawkers that work as a screen to protect pedestrians. There are a few good examples of footpaths around Dhaka city, which can serve as examples for other areas. 

We have shown such potential by transforming Hatirjheel into one of Dhaka's most beautiful urban solutions. As we have established a Metro, Express highway, flyovers, and wide roads to alleviate various urban problems faced by the inhabitants of Dhaka, we can also establish an excellent walkable city to add to a better future for Dhaka. 

Farhana Nizam Chowdhury is the Principal Architect of Studio Machang.