Two Ashulia expressway bridges open today
Dhaka's Ashulia Corridor Gains Two New Service Bridges as Elevated Expressway Project Advances
Thebangladaily.com – Wednesday marks a tangible step forward in one of Dhaka's most ambitious urban infrastructure undertakings. Two two-lane service bridges linking the Dhaur intersection with the Ashulia corridor have been opened to vehicular traffic under the Dhaka-Ashulia Elevated Expressway programme. The move is designed to relieve the chronic gridlock that has defined daily commutes along this western artery of the capital for years.
Inauguration and Official Participation
The formal opening ceremony is scheduled at Dhaur Bridge beginning at 10:30 AM. Road Transport and Bridges, Railways, and Shipping Minister Sheikh Robiul Alam will serve as chief guest, underscoring the government's direct oversight of the project's phased delivery. His presence signals that the bridges represent not merely a civil-engineering milestone but a policy commitment to alleviating one of the capital's most persistent mobility crises.
What the Bridges Do
Each of the two newly commissioned structures spans a length of 3.71 kilometres and carries two lanes of traffic. Functioning as service bridges, they provide ground-level access points that connect local road networks to the elevated expressway above. Without these ramps and connector spans, the elevated structure would remain inaccessible to drivers entering or exiting at intermediate points. In practical terms, the bridges allow commuters, freight vehicles, and industrial logistics traffic to merge onto or depart from the expressway at the Dhaur–Ashulia segment rather than being forced onto congested surface streets.
The Broader Expressway Programme
The Dhaka-Ashulia Elevated Expressway is a multi-phase infrastructure initiative intended to create a high-capacity, grade-separated corridor between the western edge of central Dhaka and the Ashulia industrial belt. Dhaka's road network, built largely for a population far smaller than today's, has struggled to absorb decades of rapid urbanisation, vehicle growth, and industrial expansion. Surface-level arterial roads along the western corridor have long operated beyond capacity, producing multi-hour delays during peak periods. An elevated alignment removes intersections, eliminates at-grade conflicts, and permits continuous-flow movement at design speeds, fundamentally changing the throughput of the corridor.
Service bridges such as the two opening today are integral to the expressway's utility. They ensure that the elevated structure does not become an isolated ribbon of pavement disconnected from the communities and commercial zones it is meant to serve. By providing controlled entry and exit points, the bridges distribute traffic demand across multiple access nodes rather than concentrating it at a single interchange.
Executing Authority and Project Governance
The Bangladesh Bridge Authority, operating under the Bridges Division of the Ministry of Road Transport and Bridges, carried out the construction of these structures. Md Masud Rana Sikder, Deputy Director and Public Relations Officer of the authority, confirmed the project's completion and opening schedule. The Bridges Division's mandate encompasses the design, supervision, and delivery of major bridge and elevated-structure works across the country, making it the natural implementing agency for expressway components of this scale.
Traffic and Economic Implications
Ashulia sits at the western terminus of one of Dhaka's most important freight and industrial corridors. Thousands of factories, warehouses, and logistics operations depend on reliable road access to move raw materials in and finished goods out. Congestion along the surface corridor has imposed substantial time costs on supply chains, increased fuel consumption, and contributed to air pollution from idling vehicles. By diverting a meaningful share of through-traffic onto the elevated alignment and its associated service bridges, the project is expected to reduce average travel times, lower accident exposure at previously saturated intersections, and improve the predictability of freight schedules.
For daily commuters, the practical effect should be a measurable reduction in peak-hour delays on the Dhaur–Ashulia stretch. Drivers who previously faced extended stop-and-go conditions on surface roads will gain the option of a faster, uninterrupted route. The two-lane configuration of each service bridge, while modest in capacity compared with the full expressway, nonetheless adds dedicated lanes that were previously absent at this segment of the corridor.
Phased Delivery and Future Phases
The opening of these two bridges represents one phase within a larger programme. Additional segments, interchanges, and connector structures are anticipated as the expressway matures toward full operational status. Each completed phase incrementally shifts traffic volumes onto the elevated alignment, progressively reducing the load on surface roads. The phased approach allows authorities to manage construction disruption, distribute investment across fiscal years, and calibrate traffic-management measures as capacity comes online.
As Dhaka's population continues to grow and vehicle ownership rises, the city's transport infrastructure must evolve in step. Elevated expressways, supported by properly engineered access bridges, offer one of the most effective tools available to a dense, land-constrained metropolis for adding capacity without requiring new right-of-way. Today's opening at Dhaur and Ashulia is a concrete demonstration of that principle in action, delivering measurable relief to one of the capital's most congested corridors.
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