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Expressway's projected cost comes down to 1/3

Saturday, December 11, 2010
Front PageExpressway's projected cost comes down to 1/3
Bidder to be picked tomorrow
Tawfique Ali

A private investor will finally be selected tomorrow for the 26km Dhaka Elevated Expressway.

Meanwhile, local experts have estimated per kilometre construction cost down to one-third of what the project's foreign consultant had projected.

The government aims to award the project (signing the agreement) by the first week of January, said Mosharraf Hossain Bhuiyan, secretary to Bangladesh Bridge Authority. The concessionaire, the investor, has to begin construction work within three months of the signing.

Out of the four short-listed, two bidders including Ital-Thai Development Company (Italy-Thailand) and Sikder-KCC JV (Bangladesh-South Korea) showed up for final bidding for the expressway project.

Though short-listed, Gammon-Bougyes JV (India-France), a globally reputed company, and China Railway International Ltd (China) did not take part in the final bidding.

The construction period is three years from the signing of the agreement and the concession period is 25 years including construction period, said Prof Jamilur Reza Chowdhury, head of the tender evaluation committee for the project.

A bidder had to score an average of 80 percent on technical competence and final selection would depend on how much financial benefit it offers to the government, said Jamilur Reza.

"For some reason they [the two other companies] did not show up in the final bidding," he said.

THE COST
Local experts estimated per kilometre construction cost of the expressway at Tk 175 crore, according to sources. The foreign consultant of the project had put the figure at Tk 500 crore.

It is possible to build per kilometre of the expressway at Tk 175 crore as per financial and technical analyses performed by Infrastructure Investment Facilitation Centre (IIFC) and a Buet team, said Prof Md Shamsul Hoque, a member of the tender committee.

Shamsul Hoque said the toll for a car for end-to-end use of the expressway is Tk 125 and Tk 100 for partial use of the expressway. A public bus has to pay double that of a car, a six-wheeler truck has to pay four times high and a vehicle with more than six wheels has to pay five times the amount for using the expressway. Motorbikes will not be allowed to use the expressway on safety grounds.

The IIFC analysed regional information on similar projects primarily in India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Singapore, Shamsul Hoque said.

The government will provide 30 percent of whatever investment the concessionaire will make in the project as viability gap fund from the Public Private Partnership (PPP) fund. The government will also provide the concessionaire with the project's right of way.

The government expects in the Request for Proposal (RFP) that the concessionaire would pay Tk 175 crore every year as concession fee. However, the exact amount depends on what the bidders will offer in the financial proposal.

Moreover, the government will get 25 percent profit of surplus business if the total daily number of transactions (vehicles using the expressway) exceeds 80,000 as per the RFP.

The concessionaire has to form a company and pay the government 37.5 percent of its income as corporate tax, said Shamsul Hoque. The government will also gain a 15 percent VAT on each transaction.

The concessionaire is required to procure 50 percent of the construction materials from the local market and pay 11 percent customs duty on the imported materials, he said.

It has to have Tk 105 crore bank guarantee.

Length of the first phase of the expressway is 26km, including five kilometres of two elevated link ways. One of them will connect Manik Mia Avenue with the expressway and the other will connect Old Dhaka, Azimpur, Dhaka University, Buet and New Market.

The government in August approved the four-lane expressway route along the existing railway corridor stretching from Shahjalal International Airport to Demra with an aim to complete it by the end of 2013.

The expressway is expected to improve the road connectivity linking important residential, commercial and business hubs within the metropolitan area, said the communications minister.

TRAFFIC CONCERNS
Some noted academicians yesterday viewed that the proposed elevated expressway will not reduce the city's nagging traffic congestion, rather keep the problem alive.

Terming the government's initiative highly ambitious, they urged it to give up the plan.

They were addressing a dialogue on 'Elevated expressway or metro rail: future of Dhaka's public transportation system' organised by the Centre for Studies in Social Transformation at the Jatiya Press Club yesterday.

Prof Serajul Islam Choudhury presided over the dialogue, while Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (Buet) former vice-chancellor Shafiullah, engineer M Inamul Haque, noted economist Prof Anu Mohammad and nuclear scientist FR Al-Siddique also spoke, said a press release.

They also demanded immediate implementation of the government's initiative to set up a metro rail to reduce the city's traffic congestion.
 
Length of the first phase of the expressway is 26km, including five kilometres of two elevated link ways. One of them will connect Manik Mia Avenue with the expressway and the other will connect Old Dhaka, Azimpur, Dhaka University, Buet and New Market.

The government in August approved the four-lane expressway route along the existing railway corridor stretching from Shahjalal International Airport to Demra with an aim to complete it by the end of 2013.

The expressway is expected to improve the road connectivity linking important residential, commercial and business hubs within the metropolitan area, said the communications minister.

That means more or less whole Dhaka will be covered by elevated roads and flyover after both this and Jatrabari flyover finished. Jatrabari flyover will start from Azimpur and will end in Kachpur connecting major highways entering dhaka.

Cant wait to see these projects get done in 3 years.

Anybody seen Kuril flyover construction work? Looks like thats pretty big too with 4 loops in it.
 

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