Repair work of Salehpur bridge on Dhaka- Aricha highway begins

Roads and Highways Department officials today started repairing one side of Salehpur bridge on Dhaka-Aricha highway after the officials detected cracks on a girder Wednesday afternoon.

Confirming the development Mohmammed Shamim Al Mamun, executive engineer (Dhaka division) at Roads and Highways Department told The Daily Star that they have started repairing the bridge from morning.

"We will try to our best to complete the repair work very soon but the problem is such work takes more time," he said.

"If we do the work very quickly, it won't be fruitful," he added.

Talking to The Daily Star over phone Mohmammed Shamim Al Mamun on Thursday had said, the bridge is vulnerable because of the cracks on the girder constructed in the 1970s.

Vehicles were asked to use the two lanes that were built much later.

It might take three weeks to repair the girder and reopen the lanes to traffic, he said.

Dhaka-Aricha Highway is one of the busiest roads in the country. Thousands of vehicles use the highway every day.

The bottleneck caused about 1.5km tailbacks between Turag bridge and Aminbazar all around the day, subjecting thousands of people to hours of congestion.

Golam Mostofa, officer-in-charge of Savar Highway Police Station, told The Daily Star that sometimes in day and night tailback are being created due to the reasons but police teams were working to clear the road.