# Urban development in Bangladesh



## Bilal9

Let's discuss all subjects related to urban development in Bangladesh on this thread such as public transportation infrastructure, public gathering spaces (including shopping malls), public entertainment venues and to some extent residential areas. The aim is to dispel misunderstanding about and present a true picture of the current public infrastructure in urban areas of Bangladesh.

To start with let's present some images of Nirjhor City, a new residential development in Bangladesh in North Dhaka.http://data:image/jpeg;base64,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
















Some shots of Hatirjheel area closer to Central Dhaka (Karwan Bazaar area)

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## Stannis Baratheon

2nd pic, what a F***ing waste of electricity. I thought the government was supposed to be working on conserving electricity, not waste it!


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## Bilal9

Karwan Bazaar CBD, central Dhaka





Bashundhara City Shopping Mall





National Assembly Building, West Dhaka





Dhaka Cantonment Gate, North Dhaka





Gulshan 2, North Dhaka





জাতীয় স্মৃতি সৌধ Jatiyo Smriti Soudho Independence memorial park and gardens, Savar, Dhaka, Bangladesh








Manik Mia Avenue, West Dhaka







Stannis Baratheon said:


> 2nd pic, what a F***ing waste of electricity. I thought the government was supposed to be working on conserving electricity, not waste it!



Bhai these luminaires are using LED elements, one street light barely uses 20 watts . 

Half of them also have solar charging units attached. They aren't using that much electricity.

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## bongbang

*China to bankroll sewage treatment plant*

*Rejaul Karim Byron*


*The government is set to build a sewage treatment plant in the capital's Khilgaon area at a cost of Tk 3,318 crore, two-thirds of which will be financed by China.*

The proposal for the Dasherkandi Sewage Treatment Plant project, which is scheduled for completion in 2019, will be placed in today's meeting of the Executive Committee of National Economic Council.

China will provide Tk 2,184 crore, or $280 million, in soft loans; the rate of interest will be about 2 percent, according to a high official of the planning ministry.

As was the case in previous loans from China, a firm nominated by its government will implement the project.

The Chinese government has already nominated Hydro China Corporation for the project, with a draft commercial contract already signed with the company in November last year.

For the project, 60 acres of land will be acquired in Gazaria area, Khilgaon.

*Once the plant has been built, sewage from Gulshan, Banani, Baridhara, Bashundhara, Tejgaon, Moghbazar, Eskaton, and parts of Dhanmondi and Kalabagan could be treated using modern techniques, according to the proposal from the planning ministry.*

At present, sewage from the proposed areas is released untreated into Balu and Shitalakhya rivers, threatening river ecology.

*With financing from the World Bank, a sewage master plan has been prepared, under which 11 plants will be around Dhaka.*


China to bankroll sewage treatment plant | The Daily Star




*New Master Plan for capital in the offing*

_*Fresh growth management area to swallow crop lands, flood flow zones*_

*August 3, 2015 12:44 am*

*Mahamudul Hasan*

*The government recently notified in the official gazette a draft Master Plan spelling out the guidelines for the development of the capital over the next two decades beginning 2016.*


The new Master Plan earmarks a vast growth management area, which would swallow crop lands and flood flow zones in and around the capital. It would repeal the existing Master Plan, said the notification.


Affected people and objectors have been requested to submit their objections or recommendations to RAJUK’s town planner within 60 days from July 7, when the draft Master plan was notified in the official gazette.


The draft Master Plan seeks to legalize several housing facilities, under construction or already built flouting the existing Master Plan and the Detailed Area Plan for the capital.


The consultants who prepared the master plan for 2016-2035 raised the question how long such unauthorized constructions would be legalized due to recurrent failure of the regulating authorities.


They recorded their reservations in the draft master plan itself.


In their review, they depicted an alarming picture of construction activities proceeding in violation of the spatial, environmental and socio-economic guidelines laid down in the existing Master Plan.


*Out of 31 guidelines in the outgoing Master Plan only eight were partially followed, resulting in unplanned development and growth of the capital, they pointed out.*


They pointed out that in violation of the guidelines in the existing Master Plan, 30 per cent of the flood flow zones in the capital and along the Shitalakhya, Balu, Turag, Buriganga and Dhaleshwari rivers had been grabbed by influential quarters.

They cited the examples of construction of 2,827 structures many of them by developers, a private medical college, an army graveyard and Mass Grave Memorial at Dhaka Uddyan on Turag River’s bank though the existing Master plan and the DAP prohibited any development activities on this flood flow zone.

They also pointed out that the government took no steps to protect the retention ponds from as prescribed by the existing Master Plan and the DAP.

They said that the DAP’s land use zoning plan for the capital had been severely compromised with the authorities looked the other way as developers and influential quarters constructed building flouting the land use zoning plane.

It resulted in unplanned development and spatial growth of the capital, they pointed out.

*The newly earmarked growth management area would include Gachcha to Kayaltiya and Konabari in Gazipur, Dhamsona, Ashulia, Hemayetpur and Aminbazar under Savar, areas around Turag, Uttara 3rd Phase, Demra, Amulia, Badda, Daksin Khan, Uttar Khan, Ajampur, areas around the Jhilmeel project, Zinjira, Keraniganj, Kutubpur, the areas around Purbachal and Golakandail in Rupganj upazila.*


*The new plan identifies Narayanganj city, Gazipur old municipal area, Tongi old municipal are, Savar, Tarabo municipal area, Jhilmeel, Siddirganj and Purbachal New Town as the capital’s suburbs.*

RAJUK town planner Md Sirajul Islam told New Age that the consultants identified the vast growth management area considering the development activities taking place there.

He said earmarking growth management areas would facilitate people in getting RAJUK’s approval to construction plans.


Saman Corporation and Han-A Urban Research Institute of Korea, Sheltech and DevCon of Bangladesh prepared the draft master plan.


In the light of the new master plan a new DAP is under preparation for the next two decades.


New Master Plan for capital in the offing | New Age

It may become a sticky thread. So putting down some rare history videos of Dhaka City on first page

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## extra terrestrial

bongbang said:


> New Master Plan for capital in the offing | New Age
> 
> It may become a sticky thread. So putting down some rare history videos of Dhaka City on first page



Old Dhaka could have been a big tourist attraction of Bangladesh or even Asia if proper planning were made, in contrary, it has been left with utter negligence... just a few months back there was a report where a 300 year old mosque was being demolished by the builders and the authority didn't even feel to stop them....

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## Bilal9

North South University Campus (This is a US accredited institution)












Grameen Phone HQ, Baridhara, Dhaka

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## extra terrestrial

*Karnaphuli tunnel construction begins in December*

CHITTAGONG, May 13, 2015 (BSS) - Road Transport and Bridges Minister Obaidul Quader on Tuesday night said that the construction work of the much awaited tunnel under the river Karnaphuli would be inaugurated in December.

The minister said Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and Chinese premier would visit the proposed construction site soon and declare the date of inauguration of the construction work of the 3.5 kilometre tunnel, to be built at a cost of US$ 100 crore.

Quader also said the government would construct another marine drive road from Mirsarai of Chittagong to Cox's Bazar while Korerhat-Ramgarh-Khagrachhari road would be tuned into a four lane one for easy transportation. 

"Besides, five kilometres road on north side of Shah Amanat Bridge and three kilometres on its south side would be turned into six-lane road at a cost of Tk 220 crore", the minister said this while addressing a reception function of the newly elected city mayor A J M Nasir Uddin.

Chittagong Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CCCI) accorded the reception to the newly elected mayor of Chittagong City Corporation (CCC), held at World Trade Centre auditorium. 

Addressing the function as the chief guest, the minister also said the government would soon carry out a feasibility test for turning Chittagong-Cox's Bazar highway into a four lane one. 

Terming the new Chittagong city mayor A J M Nasir as a 'man of deeds', Quader advised Nasir to concentrate more on turning the port city into a clean and water-logging free city.

Addressing the function, the newly elected city mayor A J M Nasir said he will work with utmost honesty, sincerity and transparency to fulfil his pre-election pledges. 

Seeking cooperation from the businessmen, A J M Nasir said he would even sacrifice his life to serve the city residents who elected him mayor and he would try to run the corporation with zero tolerance towards any kind of irregularity.

He said he would also exchange views with journalists after every three months and seek their advice to solve different problems of the port city.

CCCI president Mahbubul Alam presided over the function while Awami League law makers- MA Latif, Shamsul Hoque and Didarul Alam, administrator of Chittagong Zila Parishad MA Salam, CCCI senior vice-president Nurun Newaz Selim and vice-president Syed Jamal Ahmed, among others, were present at the function.

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## 24 Hours

Bilal9 said:


> To start with let's present some images of Nirjhor City, a new residential development in Bangladesh in North Dhaka.http://data:image/jpeg;base64,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


I visited Nirjhor the first time this summer. My father's old college roommate lives around the same area in the last pic. Such a beautiful sight, it's a shame I only stayed for a couple hours

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## black-hawk_101

Its very similar to DHA-Clifton Karachi.

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## Bilal9

Mayor Hanif Flyover construction image from 2012,












Jatrabari flyover opened in 2013









Kuril flyover and interchange








Mirpur-Airport Road Flyover

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## Bilal9

Pink city, Dhaka, Bangladesh, example of tract housing...








Major General Osmany Uddyan (park), Gulistan, Dhaka





Ramna park, Dhaka (oldest park adjoining a former race course, planned in British times)





Chandrima Uddyan (Park) w/ President Zia's Mazar





Baldha Botanical Gardens in old Dhaka









Three leaders' Mausoleum (AK Fazlul Huq, Khwaja Nazimuddin, HS Suhrawardy), near Ramna Gate

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## Bilal9

Maulana Bhashani Novo Theatre





Motijheel C/A Shapla Chattar (Roundabout) in Downtown Dhaka





Ahsan Manjil, former home of Dhaka Nawab Family in old Dhaka





Lalbagh Qila and Mausoleum of Pari Bibi in old Dhaka

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## dray

A boring thread in reply to this recent thread of mine  : Dhaka vs Kolkata

Make it a "v/s" thread to spice it up and attract eyeballs, I will contribute! Otherwise it will end up as another "Bangladeshi member only" thread. 

Just check this old "v/s" thread below by a very renowned and respectable (He gained more popularity than even @BDforever in a short time, he is now banned though due to conspiracy!  ) member @IamBengali , it got the highest viewership of 61,421 views in the history of PDF. 

Dhaka v/s Kolkata


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## Bilal9

Rain Man said:


> A boring thread in reply to this recent thread of mine  : Dhaka vs Kolkata
> 
> Make it a "v/s" thread to spice it up and attract eyeballs, I will contribute! Otherwise it will end up as another "Bangladeshi member only" thread.
> 
> Just check this old "v/s" thread below by a very renowned and respectable (He gained more popularity than even @BDforever in a short time, he is now banned though due to conspiracy!  ) member @IamBengali , it got the highest viewership of 61,421 views in the history of PDF.
> 
> Dhaka v/s Kolkata



Bhai there is no faida in D!ck measuring.

I personally am happy if you consider Kolkata to be more developed city than Dhaka. It may very well be.

Our urban areas in Bangladesh may not be perfect but they are ours. We call them home (warts 'n all). 

And I don't think me (or a lot of Bangladeshis here) consider mudslinging as a sport, no matter how many eyeballs it scores.

All I request is that you be civil, stick to the topic (Urban development in Bangladesh), ask questions but otherwise not engage in trolling and or heated discussions. The reasons people come to this thread are because they simply want to find out the state of urban development in Bangladesh. Sorry to bore you but that's all this thread will ever be.



extra terrestrial said:


> Old Dhaka could have been a big tourist attraction of Bangladesh or even Asia if proper planning were made, in contrary, it has been left with utter negligence... just a few months back there was a report where a 300 year old mosque was being demolished by the builders and the authority didn't even feel to stop them....



I think both Singapore and KL did a great job of reviving their older neighborhoods (for Singapore near the downtown boat quay area).

https://www.ura.gov.sg/uol/conservation/conservation-xml.aspx?id=BTQY

Look at what it looked like in the 50's (Doesn't look a lot different than Bangshal road)









Transformed in the early 80's but still looking a bit shabby....












And look at it today (1st one overhead shot)

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## Maira La

*Jamuna Future Park
*
According to Yahoo India, it's the largest mall in South Asia and 11th largest in the world:
10 largest shopping malls in the world | The 15 largest shopping malls in the world - Yahoo India Finance
*





*
Some pretty cool restaurant design (inside JFP):

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## dray

Bilal9 said:


> Bhai there is no faida in D!ck measuring.
> 
> I personally am happy if you consider Kolkata to be more developed city than Dhaka. It may very well be.
> 
> Our urban areas in Bangladesh may not be perfect but they are ours. We call them home (warts 'n all).
> 
> And I don't think me (or a lot of Bangladeshis here) consider mudslinging as a sport, no matter how many eyeballs it scores.
> 
> All I request is that you be civil, stick to the topic (Urban development in Bangladesh), ask questions but otherwise not engage in trolling and or heated discussions. The reasons people come to this thread are because they simply want to find out the state of urban development in Bangladesh. Sorry to bore you but that's all this thread will ever be.


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## Saiful Islam

Maira La said:


> *Jamuna Future Park
> *
> According to Yahoo India, it's the largest mall in South Asia and 11th largest in the world:
> 10 largest shopping malls in the world | The 15 largest shopping malls in the world - Yahoo India Finance
> *
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> *
> Some pretty cool restaurant design (inside JFP):



Some restaurants in Dhaka have totally blew my mind, especially those on sticky thread. Which is the best area for dining in Dhaka?


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## Homo Sapiens

@waz please make this thread sticky.

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## Maira La

Saiful Islam said:


> Some restaurants in Dhaka have totally blew my mind, especially those on sticky thread. *Which is the best area for dining in Dhaka?*



Current Dhakaites would know best! @BDforever @Doyalbaba @Species @masud @bongbang

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## ebr77

Saiful Islam said:


> Some restaurants in Dhaka have totally blew my mind, especially those on sticky thread. Which is the best area for dining in Dhaka?


there are a bunch of them in Banani -11, then in Khilgao -Taltala, Dhanmondi , uttara , gulshan ....choose the resturant depending on what kind of food you are looking for...well that's how i do it... 

PC. Syed Abbas...as aerial view

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## Bilal9

Maira La said:


> Current Dhakaites would know best! @BDforever @Doyalbaba @Species @masud @bongbang



I have several listed in my Dhaka Restaurants thread,

Restaurants in Dhaka

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## masud

Maira La said:


> Current Dhakaites would know best! @BDforever @Doyalbaba @Species @masud @bongbang



i don,t live dhaka bro...........
my home village is joypurhat. Joypurhat District - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia 
and some time in chittagong.............

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## Bilal9

New design of Ispahani colony. Existing Ispahani colony will be torn down...

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## Bilal9

Random night-time shot, probably Western Dhaka near Dhanmandi.





East West University Campus








North South University (US Accredited) Bashundhara Campus (one of the top 5 private universities in Bangladesh)
Designed by ArchitektonBD.

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## Bilal9

BDDL Notundhara Duplexes, Satarkul

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## Bilal9

Parliament house (Sangsad Bhaban) designed by Louis I. Kahn in the early sixties.

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## Bilal9

Apartments in Dhanmandi, pretty typical





Dhaka Sadar Ghat Launch Terminal - the scale of logitics operations is large to say the least.





Aerial shot of Gulshan





Dhaka Convention Center (DITF grounds next to old Tejgaon airport)








New Dhaka Museum








Uttara area

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## bongbang

Lets highlight specific areas
Agargaon Dhaka

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## Bilal9

World's largest street painting - Manik Mia Avenue (AgarGaon, Dhaka)

An Alpona is a common folk art form, made of patterns meant to adorn areas for celebration. Five of Bangladesh’s leading senior artists led 220 young artisans and thousands of citizens to create this form by hand, covering the full 1-kilometer stretch of Manik Mia Avenue in joyful celebration of the Bangla New Year.















World’s largest alpona,painted in Manik Mia Avenue on 14 April 2012, Bangladesh

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## gslv mk3

No updates about Dhaka Metro  ???


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## Saiful Islam

Bilal9 said:


> Apartments in Dhanmandi, pretty typical
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Dhaka Sadar Ghat Launch Terminal - the scale of logitics operations is large to say the least.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Aerial shot of Gulshan
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Dhaka Convention Center (DITF grounds next to old Tejgaon airport)
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> New Dhaka Museum
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Uttara area



Dhanmondi apartments look very cozy and nice to live in, must cost a bomb though?


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## Riyad

Under construction flyover in Dhaka

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## BDforever

Saiful Islam said:


> Some restaurants in Dhaka have totally blew my mind, especially those on sticky thread. Which is the best area for dining in Dhaka?





Maira La said:


> Current Dhakaites would know best! @BDforever @Doyalbaba @Species @masud @bongbang


Banani road #11 (well almost every banani road has restuarant but road #11 has most lol) and Vikarunnesa girls school area (Shiddeshori), Dhanmondi area

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## Riyad

* Dhaka Elevated Expressway *

*



*

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## bongbang

Small developments which have huge impacts on day to day life

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## Bilal9

Saiful Islam said:


> Dhanmondi apartments look very cozy and nice to live in, must cost a bomb though?



We are talking minimum 1.5 to 1.8 crore for a luxury 2000 sqft. apartment. However smaller 1200 sqft. apartments will be under one crore.


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## Bilal9

Metro rail news in local media (sorry in Bengali only)











Contruction of Dhaka Airport third terminal to start on December





Largest Dhaka Expressway project yet (20 KM)

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## Bilal9

Bangladesh’s Shahjalal Airport to get $1.57bn makeover - Airport Technology

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## Arthur

Saiful Islam said:


> Dhanmondi apartments look very cozy and nice to live in, must cost a bomb though?


Not even a small one it's a nuclear one!!


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## chaanmia

gslv mk3 said:


> No updates about Dhaka Metro  ???


as far I know, an UK based Indian company got the job  now troll yourself .


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## gslv mk3

chaanmia said:


> as far I know, an UK based Indian company got the job  now troll yourself .



which UK based Indian company..


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## Bilal9

CXB airport being upgraded per plan illustrated here, to be fourth International Airport within the country.

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## Bilal9

Posted : 02 Jul, 2015 15:54:06

*PM inaugurates construction work of Cox's Bazar Int'l Airport*​
The work on the much-sought Cox's Bazar International Airport Construction Project formally began on Thursday, aiming to expand the country’s tourism sector by attracting more and more international tourists.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina formally inaugurated the construction work through videoconferencing from her official residence Ganobhaban, a news agency report said.

This will be the country’s 4th international airport after Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport in Dhaka, Shah Amanat International Airport in Chittagong and Sylhet Osmani International Airport.

Civil Aviation and Tourism Minister Rashed Khan Menon, Housing and Public Works Minister Engineer Mosharraf Hossain spoke on the occasion from the airport premises in Cox's Bazar. Local MPs and other dignitaries were present.

Waresat Hossain Belal, Bir Protik, MP, PM's Principal Secretary Md Abul Kalam Azad, PM's Press Secretary Ihsanul Karim and Civil Aviation and Tourism Secretary Khorshed Alam Chowdhury were present at Ganobhaban during the videoconferencing.

According to the Civil Aviation and Tourism Ministry, the Tk5.78 billion project will be completed within 30 months. Once completed, spacious aircraft like Boeing 777 could be operated from the airport.

Under the project, the existing runway length will be extended to 9000 feet from 6775 feet while the width to be expanded to 200 feet from the existing 150 feet alongside boosting the strength of the runway, setting up of airfield lighting system for takeoff and landing at night, procurement of firefighting vehicles and installing other necessary equipment.

To rehabilitate over some 4,400 families living in the airport area, some 245 four-storey buildings will be constructed in Khurushkul area on the east bank of the Bakkhali River on 253 acres of land with necessary amenities, including educational and other social institutions.

Some 5,000 metric tonnes of wheat have already been allotted from Ashrayan-2 project to fill up some 41 acres of land with earth.

Besides, a bridge will be built over the Bakkhali River with Tk 2 billion under the project while Tk 2.1 billion has been earmarked kept for land development and construction of a damn to be implemented by the LGED and the Water Development Board.

Later, Civil Aviation and Tourism Minister and Housing and Public Works Minister unveiled the plaques of Cox's Bazar International Airport Construction Project on behalf of Prime Minister.

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## BDforever

@Saiful Islam you may like these resorts 
1.Nazimgarh resort
2. Dusai resort
3. Grand Sultan tea resort & Golf
4. The Palace Resort 
(All are in Sylhet Division)

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## Bilal9

*China offers assistance to upgrade Shahjalal Airport*​
Reported by: Golam Moin Uddin UNB Staff Writer
July 3, 2015 04:09:39 pm

Dhaka, July 3 (UNB) - As the government has decided to construct the third terminal at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport (HSIA), China has offered its assistance for its expansion and modernisation works.

China Airport Construction Group Corporation (CACC), a 100 percent state-owned corporation of China, sent a letter on May 20 to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina with a proposal for the construction of the third terminal, domestic terminal, VVIP complex and Cargo Village at HSIA.

In the letter, the copy of which is obtained by UNB, CACC General Manager Liu Yong said, "We believe that with our technical ability and long experience in the field of airport construction, we would be able to complete a new modern airport of international standard (as per ICAO standard) in three years' time from the start of the construction, as planned by your government."

The Chinese official in the letter said out of the estimated project investment cost of around $ 1.3 billion, depending on the approval of the final design, with the construction period of three years, the project fund may use Chinese soft loans from the bank in China.

The businesses of CACC, which has constructed some 160 international and domestic airports all over the world in past 61 years, include the turn-key projects, project management, engineering, investigation, consultation, design, supervision, construction and research.

Earlier on May 13, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina directed the authorities concerned to go ahead for constructing the third terminal of Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport (HSIA) and complete the work in a faster pace to handle growing number of passengers.

Officials at the Ministry of Civil Aviation and Tourism said the annual passenger handling capacity of the HSIA is about eight millions. In the current fiscal year, 6.7 million passengers used the airport which is increasing at the rate of 9.5 percent.

According to the officials, the number of passengers at the airport would cross eight millions in 2018. So, there will be a need for constructing a new terminal in 2019 for handing the growing passengers.

They said though the annual cargo handling capacity of the airport is two lakh tonnes, presently 2.37 lakh tonnes of cargo are transported through the airport, which means it is handling 18 percent more cargo than the present capacity.

A joint consulting firm comprising, Yushin of Korea, CPG of Singpapore and DDC of Bangladesh has been appointed to formulate a master plan for constructing necessary infrastructures to fulfil the demand of growing passengers and cargoes.

The firm conducted the feasibility study and a new master plan for the airport expansion project for 10 months. As per the master plan, a proposal has been made to complete the airport expansion work in two phases.

The master plan has proposed constructing all infrastructures excepting the second runway in the first phase. The infrastructures include third terminal, cargo village, VVIP complex and domestic terminal.

The first phase work would start this year and complete in 2019 and Tk 10,700 crore will be needed for completing the just first phase work.

In the second phase, a proposal for constructing other infrastructures, including the second runway has been made and the approximate cost of which will be Tk 2,300 crore.

As per the feasibility study, the implementation of the second phase work could be reevaluated by considering the situation on completion of the first phase work.
- See more at: UNB - China offers assistance to upgrade Shahjalal Airport

Dhaka-Mymensingh Highway









Police using radar to catch motorists exceeding speed limit on the DAC-CTG Highway

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## Bilal9

*4-lane Dhaka bypass road construction - Pvt firm selection process on*
​Shamsul Huda

The process of selecting a private firm for building the four-lane Dhaka bypass road from Joydevpur to Madanpur is progressing, sources said.

In this connection the Public Private Partnership (PPP) office is going to issue request for qualification (RFQ) in February.

Earlier, the PPP office invited registration of interest (ROI) from the private firms on November 20 and its deadline expired on Wednesday (December 24).

The government proposed to construct the 48 kilometre-long controlled access toll road along with private investments.

The Roads and Highways Department (RHD) under the Ministry of Communications is the implementing authority of the project.

The RFQ is coming just after a month at the expiry of the submission date for ROI Wednesday, a PPP official said.

With the increasing number of vehicles in the existing two-lane bypass from Joydevpur to Madanpur, the government has taken the initiative to build the road under PPP aiming to shorten distance, reduce travel time and avoid accidents.

The controlled access toll road will link N4 (Joydevpur-Jamalpur Highway) and N1 (Dhaka-Chittagong Highway). As a result transportation between Southern and Northern districts will get a boost.

Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the PPP office Syed Afsar Uddin said until December 23, a day before the closing date, a total of 10 parties have submitted their proposals.

He said in the ROI the interested parties have quoted their competency, capability, skill and solvency stating that they are eligible for doing business under PPP arrangements.

The bypass highway project includes a four-lane and a two-lane service roads.

According to sources, the bypass highway would give a faster access to the vehicles moving from Gazipur to Dhaka-Chittagong and Dhaka-Sylhet highways.

As per the feasibility study, vehicular pressure from Gazipur towards the Southern parts of the country would increase by more than 35 per cent in the next five years.

To ease the pressure, the bypass road would give access to the vehicles moving from North to South bypassing the capital city.

A RHD official said the project's cost has been estimated at $ 350 million to $ 400 million and it would be fully funded by private party investments.

He said, "We have chosen PPP in constructing the bypass as it is estimated that private investment would be viable in building the toll access roads as investors would get return in more than 20 years' time."

MMM Group, a Canada-based consulting firm, along with other local firms is working for the project's feasibility study in cooperation with the PPP office.

A few random Dhaka infra shots
















BRT TransDhaka Simulation





Alpona (Street Painting) Festival on the eve of Bengali New Year (Pohela Baishakh 2014)

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## Bilal9

*Mirpur / Banani Flyover*
*








Gulistan/Jatrabari Flyover video





Cantonment to Mirpur Bypass Drive Video





Cantonment Area Drive Video




*

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## bongbang



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## Bilal9

Purbachal Bestway City Planning Video





Dhaka City Drive Episodes - Nirjhor Residential Area

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## Saiful Islam

BDforever said:


> @Saiful Islam you may like these resorts
> 1.Nazimgarh resort
> 2. Dusai resort
> 3. Grand Sultan tea resort & Golf
> 4. The Palace Resort
> (All are in Sylhet Division)



Well I have been to Grand Sultan in moulvibazar if thats what you're talking about, it's very nice and the first of it's kind in Sylhet (Impressive for Sylhet).

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## Bilal9

Two project studies for re-using old Tejgaon Airport...

Vision for Old Airport @ Tejgaon, Dhaka, Bangladesh





Creating An Urban Oasis


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## 24 Hours

Here is a picture of a nice view in Nirjhor City at night. It's quite peaceful, almost made me forget that I was still in Dhaka


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## Nilgiri

Great pics and videos guys. Keep them coming! I especially enjoyed the driving videos....gives you that real day to day feel lacking in the pictures and concept art.

Nice to see Mahindra well represented!

My favourite kind of videos have to be from slow flying UAVs though like this:











Check out some of the other videos in that channel. Quite good!

Some real estate developer etc should do a nice long footage of large areas of Dhaka like this guy has done in Chennai:

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## Bilal9

Nilgiri said:


> Great pics and videos guys. Keep them coming! I especially enjoyed the driving videos....gives you that real day to day feel lacking in the pictures and concept art.
> 
> Nice to see Mahindra well represented!
> 
> My favourite kind of videos have to be from slow flying UAVs though like this:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Check out some of the other videos in that channel. Quite good!
> 
> Some real estate developer etc should do a nice long footage of large areas of Dhaka like this guy has done in Chennai:



Good suggestion. 

Before people compile a 30 minute drone footage,

I have some regular real estate images of Dhaka properties at my Dhaka Midrises thread, Check it out.

Midrise Architecture in Dhaka Bangladesh | Page 23

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## Bilal9

Soil testing has begun for Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) Line 3

Work begins on Bus Rapid Transit Line 3 | Dhaka Tribune

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## Nilgiri

Do we have a map of the Bus transit coverage?

Statistics of ridership? Videos?

This kind of stuff is always interesting!

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## Bilal9

Nilgiri said:


> Do we have a map of the Bus transit coverage?
> 
> Statistics of ridership? Videos?
> 
> This kind of stuff is always interesting!



BRT implementation is proceeding per planning and is on track. More when time permits. 










Dhaka Transport Coordination Authority (DTCA)

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## Nilgiri

Are such elevated sections already in place in lines 1 and 2? Or is it being implemented only for line 3?

Good concept video and big props for integrating the airport with the whole network.

With the metro coming online later, it looks like Dhaka is finally going to have some great first class public transport.

The de-congestion will definitely be a major bonus.

I am looking forward to visiting one day when all this stuff is in place (I like few things better than exploring public transport)....I have already been promising (and delaying) my Bangladeshi friends here that I will visit this nice country.

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## UKBengali

Nilgiri said:


> Are such elevated sections already in place in lines 1 and 2? Or is it being implemented only for line 3?
> 
> Good concept video and big props for integrating the airport with the whole network.
> 
> With the metro coming online later, it looks like Dhaka is finally going to have some great first class public transport.
> 
> The de-congestion will definitely be a major bonus.
> 
> I am looking forward to visiting one day when all this stuff is in place (I like few things better than exploring public transport)....I have already been promising (and delaying) my Bangladeshi friends here that I will visit this nice country.



You are more than welcome to visit BD any-day - you will find that BD people will give you are very warm welcome

As regards infrastructure in Dhaka, I think you will need to wait till around 2025 for all things like metro, elevated express-ways to be completed and so it could be a long wait.


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## Nilgiri

UKBengali said:


> You are more than welcome to visit BD any-day - you will find that BD people will give you are very warm welcome



I know this already haha. Friends here and their families...good people to know, they share with you all their troubles and dreams...they open up to you when they are not busy stuffing you with their Bengali cuisine. I count many of them as my best friends. They make fun of me, I make fun of them....it goes back and forth.

That hospitality is never far away whatever place you go to in South Asia....but Bengalis have an extra warmth that is hard to describe....I think only Tagore can do it the best in his poems.

Maybe I will visit sooner and then visit again later to see the changes. I did this with my hometown Coimbatore over many years....it has started to become unrecognizable to me in many places....and then you finally come across one moment or situation...and you know things have not changed at all really lol.

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## ebr77

gslv mk3 said:


> No updates about Dhaka Metro  ???


=D they are digging small holes all over the planned routes, they are just starting....it's not going to be like Delhi metro initially though even after it's completed. I will try to upload some pics ...of their digging next time

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## ebr77

lol...what's the max size of image we can upload ?


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## Bilal9

yasinbin said:


> lol...what's the max size of image we can upload ?



I have uploaded up to 2048X1600 or so pixels and it showed up. Larger images take more time to render because they are bigger files.

Hatirjheel area traffic...mid-Dhaka.

Hatirjheel is the city's new 'breathing space'. Plans are in the offing for shopping areas, entertainment venues, a Ferris wheel, boat quays etc. etc.

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## Nilgiri

Bilal9 said:


> I have uploaded up to 2048X1600 or so pixels and it showed up. Larger images take more time to render because they are bigger files.
> 
> Hatirjheel area traffic...mid-Dhaka.
> 
> Hatirjheel is the city's new 'breathing space'. Plans are in the offing for shopping areas, entertainment venues, a Ferris wheel, boat quays etc. etc.



CNG auto's for the win! Are they Bajaj?


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## Bilal9

Nilgiri said:


> CNG auto's for the win! Are they Bajaj?



Bingo! Majority are Bajaj - some are from other brands (LML-Vespa)?

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## haviZsultan

Great pictures. It is good to see Bengal developing and strengthening its economy. Its a treat to watch since I consider Bengali people my own. When Jinnah made Pakistan he made it with bengal and we stupid west pakistanis threw it away with our weak and pathetic thinking and not being able to look beyond things from an ethnic sense. I wish Bengal all the best and its development is great. I am thankful that Bengal is progressing



Bilal9 said:


> Pink city, Dhaka, Bangladesh, example of tract housing...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Major General Osmany Uddyan (park), Gulistan, Dhaka
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Ramna park, Dhaka (oldest park adjoining a former race course, planned in British times)
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Chandrima Uddyan (Park) w/ President Zia's Mazar
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Baldha Botanical Gardens in old Dhaka
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> *Three leaders' Mausoleum (AK Fazlul Huq, Khwaja Nazimuddin, HS Suhrawardy), near Ramna Gate*



I am glad that more than Mujib Ur Rehman Bengal remembers these people (in bold)... they risked their lives to form Pakistan, evidence that Bengalis once lived and died for Pakistan. We threw away half the land. It was purely us west pakistanis fault.

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## Arthur

Nilgiri said:


> CNG auto's for the win! Are they Bajaj?


Bajaj has a local production factory under JV here in BD.

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## Bilal9

haviZsultan said:


> Great pictures. It is good to see Bengal developing and strengthening its economy. Its a treat to watch since I consider Bengali people my own. When Jinnah made Pakistan he made it with bengal and we stupid west pakistanis threw it away with our weak and pathetic thinking and not being able to look beyond things from an ethnic sense. I wish Bengal all the best and its development is great. I am thankful that Bengal is progressing
> 
> I am glad that more than Mujib Ur Rehman Bengal remembers these people (in bold)... they risked their lives to form Pakistan, evidence that Bengalis once lived and died for Pakistan. We threw away half the land. It was purely us west pakistanis fault.



Yes Bhai what happened did happen but it was forty years ago. Nobody in Bangladesh keeps those grudges except who need to do politics with it. All Pakistani people (as well as Indians) are our brothers and sisters and yes many of them are living and working locally.

We can learn a lesson from the past but it is time to move on and face the future.



Khan saheb said:


> Bajaj has a local production factory under JV here in BD.



Yes they make motorbikes. Not autorickshaws though - or they maybe just assemble them.

Baby taxis were supposed to go out of circulation many moons ago. What saved them locally was the CNG engine.

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## Arthur

Bilal9 said:


> Yes they make motorbikes. Not autorickshaws though - or they maybe just assemble them.
> 
> Baby taxis were supposed to go out of circulation many moons ago. What saved them locally was the CNG engine



No,Bajaj Motorbike production is a different story.
Uttara Motors had a JV with bajaj.First they had a assembly and marketing rights.Now a days the produce their own models.Engine is imported from China.last year I read somewhere that They are going to kick off their own engine production.I am not sure about if they still assembles Bjaj or not.
Baja now a days shares the market with many other local and foreign brands.Some other small companies assembles them now a days,that too with a parts and engine production rights.

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## Bilal9

Khan saheb said:


> No,Bajaj Motorbike production is a different story.
> Uttara Motors had a JV with bajaj.First they had a assembly and marketing rights.Now a days the produce their own models.Engine is imported from China.last year I read somewhere that They are going to kick off their own engine production.I am not sure about if they still assembles Bjaj or not.
> Baja now a days shares the market with many other local and foreign brands.Some other small companies assembles them now a days,that too with a parts and engine production rights.



Thanks for the info Khan Shaheb. 

I think the time is now ripe to ban Bicycle Rickshaws altogether. They have no place in modern Dhaka and are a hazard to other forms of speedy transport.

People are just too lazy to walk. Otherwise rickshaws would be extinct a long time ago. Witness what happened in most other South Asian cities. Can't find rickshaws anywhere.

Here's a video of Walton production process for a few things, one of them being motorbikes...





New bike by Walton (Speedo 150), locally designed and engineered...

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## 24 Hours

Bilal9 said:


> I think the time is now ripe to ban Bicycle Rickshaws altogether. They have no place in modern Dhaka and are a hazard to other forms of speedy transport.


But then what will be the next Rickshaw capital of the world?


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## Bilal9

SHK said:


> But then what will be the next Rickshaw capital of the world?



Somewhere else brother? Not here.

Oi romanticism-er din shesh. We have to be practical now. 

The alternative is to sit in perpetual traffic jams for hours...who's up for that alternative.....??

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## 24 Hours

Bilal9 said:


> Somewhere else brother? Not here.
> 
> Oi romanticism-er din shesh. We have to be practical now.
> 
> The alternative is to sit in perpetual traffic jams for hours...who's up for that alternative.....??


I wasn't really trying to be serious there, would really like to see them go. Although Dhaka wouldn't be the same it's for the best. Anything to cut down on traffic is welcome.

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## Arthur

Bilal9 said:


> Thanks for the info Khan Shaheb.
> 
> I think the time is now ripe to ban Bicycle Rickshaws altogether. They have no place in modern Dhaka and are a hazard to other forms of speedy transport.
> 
> People are just too lazy to walk. Otherwise rickshaws would be extinct a long time ago. Witness what happened in most other South Asian cities. Can't find rickshaws anywhere.
> 
> Here's a video of Walton production process for a few things, one of them being motorbikes...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> New bike by Walton (Speedo 150), locally designed and engineered...


Should have banned them 12 years ago.But any day is good day.


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## mb444

What will the rickshawallas and associated linked industries do for a job.... It's a very labour intensive as well a green from of transport... Needs careful thinking and action post cost benefit analysis keeping in mind needs of the entire populace


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## Mr.Nair

Bangladesh favours Japan for port and power plant, in blow to China - The Economic Times


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## Rokto14

Bilal9 said:


> CXB airport being upgraded per plan illustrated here, to be fourth International Airport within the country.


Source of this photo?


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## Bilal9

Well why don't we let the chips fall where they may.

For now the Chinese are biding time and won't try to best Japan in competing for Asian Infrastructure projects. The Chinese don't have a lot of money to waste at present.
Sonadia (CTG) may not fill an immediate strategic need. The Chinese have Myanmar ports.
Chinese Nuclear subs don't need to dock in Bangladesh to 'case out the neighborhood' - I'm sure they are already casing out the INS Naval base north of Vizag where the Arihant boomers will be home-ported. And I'm sure the one in Karwar is being watched as well.
Bangladesh needs a deep sea port (like) yesterday. Especially one that has a huge powerplant built on the port itself. The Japanese plants are efficient, reliable and use proven technology. This is not a bad combination.
During the last visit of the Japanese PM to Bangladesh this year, he promised us favors due to us supporting their bid for their seat in the UN security council. This is fulfilling part of the favor.
The Chinese will have _plenty _of other work - believe me. There's road and bridge infrastructure projects they will be involved with for years to come (latest is the Padma bridge). 



Rokto14 said:


> Source of this photo?



Bhai I think this came from the Facebook page of the consortium that is actively working on this project. An international airport will be built. Now whether it looks like this - maybe. It won't look like CTG airport for sure and will be quite larger.

And it will have an airbase connected with it - probably to house the maritime strike aircraft the air-force is inducting.

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## Bilal9

Hatirjheel at night

Image copyrights Mirzazeehan





Designtex Corporate Office, Uttara





NH Tower, Banani - 15 storied with 3 basements
*





Mirpur DOHS Army Shopping Center, Pallabi-Airport Link Rd - 11 stories*
*





Unity Complex, Badda










*

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## Bilal9

new RAJUK HQ, Mohakhali





Continental Apparels, Tejgaon I/A





*Supertex Garments Tower, Gazipur*
*




*
Beximco Headquarters





South Square and Cityscape Tower, Gulshan





Hadi Tower,Gulshan





Banani Rd. 11

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## Bilal9

14-storied SEL Trident Tower, Purana Paltan





Hamid Tower, Gulshan-2





Grameen Telecom Building





Gulshan 2 circle





Meena Bazar, Gulshan





Uttara

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## Bilal9

Random shots

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## bongbang

*Bangladeshi expat to build country's tallest building*

A Bangladeshi investor will construct the tallest building in the country as a Chinese investor has backed off from the project, the finance minister said yesterday.

*Kali Pradip Chaudhuri, the chairman and founder of the KPC Group of Companies, will build the 300-metre tower on a 40-acre land in Purbachal, AMA Muhith told reporters.*

He said some work for building the convention centre had been finalised after Chaudhuri, who lives in the US, showed his interest in the project. 

“It is all done. Now, his people will come and start their work within weeks.”

Muhith said the government had agreed to provide the Bangladesh expatriate with the land in Purbachal to set up a planned international convention centre.

Chaudhuri, who is from Sylhet, would also build a hotel, an exhibition centre and a stadium around the proposed building.

“Chaudhuri builds the tallest tower wherever he goes.

“He [Chaudhuri] wanted to do something for Bangladesh. I have been talking to him for the last five to six years. His heart aches as he said he had done nothing for the country.

“Now, I have to sit with the land department about the issue.”

The minister said the construction work of the convention centre must be completed and it should be ready for use by May 2016. An annual meeting of the Islamic Development Bank is scheduled to be held there that year. 

The KPC Group is engaged in numerous businesses around the world serving diverse industries such as healthcare services and facilities, pharmaceutical and biotechnology, education, real estate, infrastructure development, agriculture, architecture and engineering, alternative energy, waste management, travel services and information technology. 

Bangladeshi expat to build country's tallest building | The Daily Star

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## Bilal9

bongbang said:


> *Bangladeshi expat to build country's tallest building*
> 
> A Bangladeshi investor will construct the tallest building in the country as a Chinese investor has backed off from the project, the finance minister said yesterday.
> 
> *Kali Pradip Chaudhuri, the chairman and founder of the KPC Group of Companies, will build the 300-metre tower on a 40-acre land in Purbachal, AMA Muhith told reporters.*
> 
> He said some work for building the convention centre had been finalised after Chaudhuri, who lives in the US, showed his interest in the project.
> 
> “It is all done. Now, his people will come and start their work within weeks.”
> 
> Muhith said the government had agreed to provide the Bangladesh expatriate with the land in Purbachal to set up a planned international convention centre.
> 
> Chaudhuri, who is from Sylhet, would also build a hotel, an exhibition centre and a stadium around the proposed building.
> 
> “Chaudhuri builds the tallest tower wherever he goes.
> 
> “He [Chaudhuri] wanted to do something for Bangladesh. I have been talking to him for the last five to six years. His heart aches as he said he had done nothing for the country.
> 
> “Now, I have to sit with the land department about the issue.”
> 
> The minister said the construction work of the convention centre must be completed and it should be ready for use by May 2016. An annual meeting of the Islamic Development Bank is scheduled to be held there that year.
> 
> The KPC Group is engaged in numerous businesses around the world serving diverse industries such as healthcare services and facilities, pharmaceutical and biotechnology, education, real estate, infrastructure development, agriculture, architecture and engineering, alternative energy, waste management, travel services and information technology.
> 
> Bangladeshi expat to build country's tallest building | The Daily Star



*Bhai BongBang - I don't know what to say.*

*This guy is the biggest fraud and scammer in the world!! *
*He is in my local area LA so I know!!*
*
Desher Jonno Mon Kandey !?! Minister-ra shob Gadha ar Bekuber Dol !*

Look at this below. *No bank should give him any loan!! **Shob taka nia bhaiga jabey!!*


Most of his companies are front companies only (Bhua). He apparently fed Muhith some big money for Muhith to say this. He is well known locally in Los Angeles as a big fraudster. I have lost complete faith on govt. officers in Bangladesh. They don't know how to Google?

I have some choice words for this idiot and his compatriots.....

Shillong Medical College scam: KPC owned Chemgenpharma only on paper

http://www.allianceforpatientsafety.org/chaudhuri-articles.pdf

This is his world class HQ - a two room office in Riverside,

Google Maps

Ek number DhappaBaaj!

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## Bilal9

Sadarghat

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## Bilal9

More random shots

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## Nabil365

Bilal9 said:


> More random shots


Where di you get so many beautiful photos from???(just curious)


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## Bilal9

Nabil365 said:


> Where di you get so many beautiful photos from???(just curious)



Amar collection 

Nah just joking 

If you search Flickr etc. you'll find plenty of images....


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## Nabil365

Bilal9 said:


> Amar collection
> 
> Nah just joking
> 
> If you search Flickr etc. you'll find plenty of images....


Nice one...I fell for it!


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## damiendehorn

Right now Gulshan Avenue seems like the premiere location to have your corporate HQ. Can some one please name other potential main roads thats coming up that one can rival it in the future? I can think of the ring road around Hatirjheel lake, Satmajid road, Uttara main road...

Would be helpful, if some one can give a few ideas, wide long avenue that can compare....


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## Species

damiendehorn said:


> Right now Gulshan Avenue seems like the premiere location to have your corporate HQ. Can some one please name other potential main roads thats coming up that one can rival it in the future? I can think of the ring road around Hatirjheel lake, Satmajid road, Uttara main road...
> 
> Would be helpful, if some one can give a few ideas, wide long avenue that can compare....



Purbachal I think, there would be a 300 ft wide approach road similar to that near Baridhara.

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## Bilal9

Species said:


> Purbachal I think, there would be a 300 ft wide approach road similar to that near Baridhara.



The roads around Hatirjheel will have several planned 30+ story highrises and will look great next to the water. If you go through my midrises thread in the 'General images' section you'll get some idea.

Also all the Banani airport road structures built for garments will be demolished to make way for a high rise corridor.

Those are what immediately comes to mind.

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## bongbang

These were some old nice photos taken in Gulisthan-Paltan and Shahbagh

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## Species

Bilal9 said:


> The roads around Hatirjheel will have several planned 30+ story highrises and will look great next to the water. If you go through my midrises thread in the 'General images' section you'll get some idea.
> 
> Also all the Banani airport road structures built for garments will be demolished to make way for a high rise corridor.
> 
> Those are what immediately comes to mind.



Hatirjheel will look gorgeous then, I will check the thread now!

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## damiendehorn

OK, so the roads to look for are:

Gulshan Avenue
Purbachal
Hatirjheel link road
Satmasjid road
Uttara Mymensingh road

in the next decade, Hatirjheel is going to look fantastic. Imagine modern highrise and midrise buildings along the lake side....its going to be awsome. Then there is the tejgaon industrial area, I suspect that area will be converted to commercial office buildings to.....land prices are so high that a lot of the factories will shift out of Dhaka

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## Rokto14

Bilal9 said:


> The roads around Hatirjheel will have several planned 30+ story highrises and will look great next to the water. If you go through my midrises thread in the 'General images' section you'll get some idea.
> 
> Also all the Banani airport road structures built for garments will be demolished to make way for a high rise corridor.
> 
> Those are what immediately comes to mind.



But isn't the Banani airport road too close to the airport and there is a height restriction there for the flight path.


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## Bilal9

Rokto14 said:


> But isn't the Banani airport road too close to the airport and there is a height restriction there for the flight path.



The orientation of the runway (if you see the map) is NW and SE, which is completely away from Banani Airport Road thoroughfare. The approach (final leg for landing) is typically over Uttara, while takeoff is over Gulshan/Baridhara and Badda, These areas still mostly have low-rises not over ten stories.

By the time planes climb steeply, and reach near the Gulshan No.2 Highrises and Westin, the airplanes are easily at minimum 3000 ft. height, while Westin etc. is at 300 ft. max. So no issues there. Look at this image,








Species said:


> Hatirjheel will look gorgeous then, I will check the thread now!



There are some nice pics of Hatirjheel in the latter part of the thread,

Midrise Architecture in Dhaka Bangladesh | Page 21



damiendehorn said:


> OK, so the roads to look for are:
> 
> Gulshan Avenue
> Purbachal
> Hatirjheel link road
> Satmasjid road
> Uttara Mymensingh road
> 
> in the next decade, Hatirjheel is going to look fantastic. Imagine modern highrise and midrise buildings along the lake side....its going to be awsome. Then there is the tejgaon industrial area, I suspect that area will be converted to commercial office buildings to.....land prices are so high that a lot of the factories will shift out of Dhaka



Yup all of Tejgaon will get converted to Commercial Highrises I imagine. This should be done in a planned way. But the roads are already laid out in a very nice grid pattern so this should be easy. This is how it was designed in the early 50's.

Industrial activity wise Tejgaon was not really a runaway success.

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## Homo Sapiens

Sea Pearl begins its operation at Cox’s Bazar | Dhaka Tribune

today's paper >> business >> published: 00:33 september 20, 2015
* Sea Pearl begins its operation at Cox’s Bazar *
*Tribune Report *





The newly launched luxury hotel Sea Pearl at Cox’s Bazar 
Photo- DHAKA TRIBUNE
*Country’s largest five-star hotel Sea Pearl Beach Resort and Spa has begun its commercial operation at Cox’s Bazar.*

Industry Minister Amir Hossain Amu formally inaugurated the luxury hotel on Thursday last.

Prime Bank has financed the big project worth Tk600 crore through syndication loan from nine commercial banks.

Aminul Haque Shamim, managing director of the newly launched Sea Pearl said, “Nine banks have invested Tk200 crore in the project through syndication while rest of investment was made from own financing.”
*

He claimed that the hotel was the largest in Bangladesh in terms of international time-sharing with Royal Tulip. *

Prime Bank financed Tk97 crore while rest of Tk103 crore was jointly financed by Mutual Trust Bank, Standard Bank, Pubali Bank, One Bank, Bangladesh Commerce Bank, Trust Bank, NCC Bank and Modhumoti Bank.

The loan can be paid in six years with a one-year grace period.

Prime Bank Managing Director Ahmed Kamal Khan Chowdhury said, “Banks investment in this project will not be a risky one as an analysis found that the occupancy rate of the hotel is above 40% which is profitable.

Moreover, lower interest rate will reduce the risk of the project, he opined.

Banks are interested to invest for long time in hotel construction as tourism sector is growing in Bangladesh, said Golam Hafiz Ahmed, managing director of NCC Bank.

“Our targeted people are mainly local businessmen and foreigners but middle class people can also afford the cost of the hotel,” said A H M Mokbul Hossain, chief executive officer of Sea Pearl.


*The hotel with 493 key rooms has been built on 15 acres of land along the sea beach. The minimum price of a hotel room is Tk9,000 per day. The most lucrative feature of the hotel is the two private beaches, one for foreigners while another for the local tourists. *

- See more at: Sea Pearl begins its operation at Cox’s Bazar | Dhaka Tribune

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## Bilal9



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## Bilal9

China offers assistance to upgrade Dhaka airport | New AgeChina offers assistance to upgrade Dhaka airport | New Age

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## Rokto14

Bilal9 said:


> China offers assistance to upgrade Dhaka airport | New AgeChina offers assistance to upgrade Dhaka airport | New Age



Can't wait for the construction to start man! Any renderings of the new terminal and the airport plan?

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## Bilal9

Rokto14 said:


> Can't wait for the construction to start man! Any renderings of the new terminal and the airport plan?



I've been looking but none of the three design consultants (local, SG, KR) posted anything on their websites. Too preliminary I think....

Apparently the SG consultant stated that the main hall in the third terminal will end up looking like the CHANGI new terminal - which they also designed. I really would not expect any less. 

এখানের troll গুলির মুখ বন্ধ হলে কিছু শান্তি আসবে আমাদের section-এ

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## mehedi44

Any news on Sonadia Deep Sea port? Former adviser of Army backed caretaker govt said few days ago that Govt. has dropped this project from Fast Track Project. Channel 24 reported few days ago that govt will conduct a fresh feasibility study again. If the news is true then it is a major setback for our country....


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## Nabil365

mehedi44 said:


> Any news on Sonadia Deep Sea port? Former adviser of Army backed caretaker govt said few days ago that Govt. has dropped this project from Fast Track Project. Channel 24 reported few days ago that govt will conduct a fresh feasibility study again. If the news is true then it is a major setback for our country....


How is it a setback?More study means more planning?


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## mehedi44

Nabil365 said:


> How is it a setback?More study means more planning?


The respective org. will take 2-3 yrs for feasibility study + govt. will take 1-2 yrs to appoint an organization= 5 yrs +
Govt will delay to start the work ( to negotiate potential country to finance the project, another 1-2 yrs)= 7-8 yrs at best.
All these actions are ok if they are willing to make the project happen...but govt is just dragging foot with this issue in the name of geo-politics...What is more..planning minister few months ago said that govt's interest now centers around Payra port as world powers are quite uneasy with Chinese involvement in Sonadia. Therefore govt is now planning to convert Payra into a deep sea port. But the fact is that draft of Payra is only 9-10 metre which is almost equivalent to Chittagong port. I think he made that statement to allay normal people, intellectuals and mask the fact that India pressed Govt to abandon the project. A few weeks ago Blloomberg published a report titled "Japan Beating China In indian Ocean deep Sea Port" where they said Bangladesh requested JAICA to conduct a feasibility study on Matarbari as a potential Deep sea port site. A study report by JAICA on Matarbari published by ERD is also in favor of Matarbari. In their report they pictured Sonadia as an Environmentally Critical Area ( sonadia is almost entirely covered by mangrove forest ). The construction work of Matarbari is scheduled to start next year. But it is still unclear whether Matarbari will be a full fledged deep sea port or will handle imported coal only. May be some other senior member like BDforever can shed some light. Happy Eid-ul-Adha to everyone


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## mb444

BAL scums have abandoned sonadia as per their masters dictat

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## Bilal9

mb444 said:


> BAL scums have abandoned sonadia as per their masters dictat



It certainly looks that way. This is a source of grave concern for Bharat. The fact that we are cow-towing to their demands is shameful to say the least....

Matarbari may see the same fate. But a deep sea port for container mother ships (80,000 to 100,000 ton capacity) is a must now for Bangladesh' rapid progress. Trying to please another country will harm our own interest and we need very strong diplomacy at this time to make it a reality.

New Delhi considers having a deep sea port anywhere near Cox's Bazaar a security issue because they feel it could be a sanctuary for Chinese subs. Bharatiya govt. is paranoid to the point that they are building subterranean ports for Arihant class subs 50 km North of Vizag (INS Varsha). They're building VLF transmitters and listening posts at all sorts of Eastern coast locations, including Paradip which is a deep sea port on the Orissa coast. They have also stepped up patrols in the upper Bay of Bengal area using their larger OPV's and corvettes.

This is naturally Bharats backyard containing a lot of their urban centers, capital assets and industrial resources - so they will try to protect it. Letting a deep sea port being built in territory not under their direct control is not seen as a good thing.


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## Nabil365

Skypower to invest $4.3b in solar power | The Daily Star

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## Bilal9

Time to re-energize this thread with some recent urban images (starting with Dhaka). There may be a few duplicates (possibly) but don't pay heed....

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## Bilal9

More images...in the last two years there were roughly two hundred glass towers like this come up in Dhaka....









Construction going on as far as the eye can see.....








Something nostalgic..Chemistry Dept., Dhaka University (Curzon Hall, built at the turn of the century and named after Lord Curzon, Administrator of Bengal).





Dhanmandi Residential Area is lined with lakes and Lotus blooms...

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## Bilal9

Some more....

Dhaka hosted the ICC Cricket World Cup 17th Feb 2011. Opening Ceremony ranked by IMG as the second best grand opening in the World.


























Dhaka, Hazrat Shahjalal Int'l Airport (DAC) Bangladesh - Cockpit View

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## Bilal9

Two dense middle class neighborhoods in Dhaka

Bailey Road






Kalyanpur

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## Bilal9

More dense areas....





















This is how we feel about fascism as a moderate Muslim country - unlike large neighboring countries which have fascist political parties today.





Uttara

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## Bilal9



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## Bilal9



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## Bilal9



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## 24 Hours

Bilal9 said:


>


We should make a duplicate but, with a picture of Churchill instead. In remembrance of the famine in 1943.

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## Bilal9

Husaini Dalan- a Shia shrine






Recycled iron sculpture
















Victory Day

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## damiendehorn

Bilal9 said:


> Husaini Dalan- a Shia shrine
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Recycled iron sculpture
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Victory Day



Dude the BD government needs to hire you as the minister of tourism or as a PR consultant. Good job...


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## Bilal9

Road along Hatirjheel Lake












Karwan Bazaar








Random residential neighborhoods....













damiendehorn said:


> Dude the BD government needs to hire you as the minister of tourism or as a PR consultant. Good job...



Ha ha Thanks for the vote .

Very kind of you bhai.

Just trying to re-pay my birth-dues to my mother-country, that's all.

I know those close to me sometimes get tired for my dedication in this area, but we can't be that selfish now - can we?

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## damiendehorn

Bilal9 said:


> Road along Hatirjheel Lake
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Karwan Bazaar
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Random residential neighborhoods....
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Ha ha Thanks for the vote .
> 
> Very kind of you bhai.
> 
> Just trying to re-pay my birth-dues to my mother-country, that's all.
> 
> I know those close to me sometimes get tired for my dedication in this area, but we can't be that selfish now - can we?



I never get tired bro, wish we had a lot more like you who actually cared for their country (even if its just by birth).


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## Bilal9

Old Tejgaon Airport (Dhaka) and environs....

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## Arthur

Hey @Bilal9 request a mod merge this one with the sticky one??

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## Bilal9

Khan saheb said:


> Hey @Bilal9 request a mod merge this one with the sticky one??



Yup great idea!

@waz bhai can you kindly oblige? Thanks in advance

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## Nilgiri

Is Tejgaon airport used for anything?

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## damiendehorn

Nilgiri said:


> Is Tejgaon airport used for anything?



When i was there it was used for flying the PM around, a heliport. It was also used as a parade ground for independence day.

Would love to see it either turned into a modern Central Park or as a UBER modern commercial area with the runway like biggggg avenue to hold the independence parades and other celebrations.

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## Bilal9

Nilgiri said:


> Is Tejgaon airport used for anything?



The Air Force owns it and uses it for Helicopter flights I believe.

Plus it is also used for large scale parades and national events.



damiendehorn said:


> When i was there it was used for flying the PM around, a heliport. It was also used as a parade ground for independence day.
> 
> Would love to see it either turned into a modern Central Park or as a UBER modern commercial area with the runway like biggggg avenue to hold the independence parades and other celebrations.



Even after keeping the runway for emergency uses - they could turn it into a nice commercial complex. The former Myrtle Beach AFB in South Carolina State was turned into the 'Market Common', an upscale urbane village offering shopping, dining and residences. This could bring the AF some good revenue.






In fact they already developed Nirjhor city in the Dhaka Cantonment along these lines.

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## damiendehorn

Bilal9 said:


> The Air Force owns it and uses it for Helicopter flights I believe.
> 
> Plus it is also used for large scale parades and national events.
> 
> 
> 
> Even after keeping the runway for emergency uses - they could turn it into a nice commercial complex. The former Myrtle Beach AFB in South Carolina State was turned into the 'Market Common', an upscale urbane village offering shopping, dining and residences. This could bring the AF some good revenue.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> In fact they already developed Nirjhor city in the Dhaka Cantonment along these lines.



With the land prices in Dhaka now, they could litterally fund a whole new purpose built mini military city outside Dhaka by leasing out that land...

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## Bilal9

damiendehorn said:


> With the land prices in Dhaka now, they could litterally fund a whole new purpose built mini military city outside Dhaka by leasing out that land...



Yup I agree completely. 

But this is prime land. I don't think they'd lease it out. Sena Kalyan Sangstha will develop it - and make money by giving the civilians access but they wouldn't lease it if I know what the Armed Forces bigwigs are thinking.

They still want to use it in emergencies.

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## damiendehorn

Bilal9 said:


> Yup I agree completely.
> 
> But this is prime land. I don't think they'd lease it out. Sena Kalyan Sangstha will develop it - and make money by giving the civilians access but they wouldn't lease it if I know what the Armed Forces bigwigs are thinking.
> 
> They still want to use it in emergencies.



Whether they lease it to the private sector on 99 year leases or develop it themselves....either way its a huge untapped resource that they could use to fund future projects. The army is very professional, and their project management experience is very impressive.

I really hope they consider developing the land.

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## Nabil365

Bangladesh fires up large-scale solar to boost power generation| Reuters


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## Bilal9



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## jahidus2005

chittagong , cox bazar , brand new tulip sea pearl 5 star hotel and resort

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## Bilal9

More mid-rises - Dhaka is the capital for mid-rises because of a 220 feet height restriction. Hundreds of these structures germinating like mushrooms all over the city. Unusual for South Asia...

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## Bilal9

*International Convention City, Bashundhara*



DSC_9604 by Mithila Azad, on Flickr




DSC_9577 by Mithila Azad, on Flickr

Look at that density!


DSC_9116 by Mithila Azad, on Flickr

Not sure where



DSC_9571 by Mithila Azad, on Flickr

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## Bilal9

Dhaka5 by ASaber91, on Flickr




Dhaka4 by ASaber91, on Flickr




Dhaka3 by ASaber91, on Flickr




Dhaka2 by ASaber91, on Flickr

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## Bilal9

*North South University, Dhaka*



NSU Campus by Rajiv Ashrafi, on Flickr




NSU Campus by Rajiv Ashrafi, on Flickr

*Daffodil University, CSE Department*



Architecture by Raktim proloy, on Flickr

*Monno Medical College, Manikganj*



Monno Medical College, Manikgonj by Tarek Mahmud, on Flickr

*Hatirjheel*

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## extra terrestrial

CC - Meer Sadi

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## Bilal9

extra terrestrial said:


> View attachment 291999
> 
> 
> CC - Meer Sadi



Two more from the general area...









CC- Rakib2277 on flickr

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## Aung Zaya

nice photos....  any BCR FAR ratio is there..? and any high limited by Gov..?


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## Bilal9

Aung Zaya said:


> nice photos....  any BCR FAR ratio is there..? and any high limited by Gov..?



Can't really tell you specifics but the offset area on the sides of a building are adjusted according to height. For example, a twenty story building has to be farther away from the street and boundaries than say -a five story building. This is for older areas - newer planned residential communities (luxury ones) more often have bigger offsets and have designated walking trails, sidewalks. 

Height around five mile radius of airports is limited to about 160 feet I think. Closer than one mile it is even less (~50 feet).


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## Bilal9

Comilla gets a tunnel underpass under Cantonment...

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## Bilal9

Hatirjheel shots - the second one shows the U-Loop. Two U-Loops are being built for the Hatirjheel project: one at the Rampura/Banasree area (work started in early 2015) and one at Hatirjheel near Badda. The Rampura loop has been pictured second last. They will be used exclusively for cars that want to either exit or enter Hatirjheel from either Badda or Rampura while avoiding traffic on Pragati Sarani below.

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## Bilal9

Mirpur Cricket Stadium, Dhaka


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## Bilal9

Inani Beach Resort, Cox's Bazar, Chittagong
By Bangladesh Army Welfare Trust





Chandrapahar Resort, Bandarban, Chittagong
By Bangladesh Army Welfare Trust




Image credits: Hasan Tanvir



Newly opened Royal Tulip Sea Resort in Cox's Bazaar









Infinity Pool and atrium...





Sauna and massage services...

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## Bilal9

A few shots courtesy of ASaber91, on Flickr...


















And a few from Ranan Rahim, of Dhaka (first image) and CTG container ports.

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## Bilal9

SHANTA PROPERTIES FORUM ONE at Tejgaon, Dhaka

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## Bilal9

Three more from midtown Dhaka...

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## Arthur

Go Bilal bhai go!!!!

Thread already looks awesome!!

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## zip

Nice to see Bangladesh progressing.. Good pictures.. Keep it coming

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## Bilal9

Khan saheb said:


> Go Bilal bhai go!!!!
> 
> Thread already looks awesome!!



Thanks Bhai. Tomrao ekta duita post Dio,

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## Bilal9

A few shots of Barisal, an ancient historic small town deep in southern Bangladesh, usually reachable only by river from Dhaka.






















Launch terminal

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## Bilal9

Barisal is also home to the famous Guthia Mosque






Image credits: Ehtesham Khaled

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## Bilal9

Two of the older student dormitories....

Mir Mosharraf Hossain Student Hall, Jahangir Nagar University...now about forty years old






Salimullah Muslim Hall, Dhaka University...now more than a century old

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## Nilgiri

Great pictures! Keep them coming!

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## LuCiFeR_DeCoY

Luxury housing in Gulshan by Navana Real Estare

























Affordable housing project in Mirpur Area by Navana real estate

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## Bilal9

National Assembly and area















Gulshan area

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## Bilal9

Midtown Dhaka...older buildings














Dhaka Cantonment











Panthapath (Sunset Way)

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## Bilal9

Mirpur DOHS





Ramna Park





Downtown... Motijheel





Dhaka Cantonment

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## Bilal9

Kamal Ataturk Avenue











Airport Road














Le Meridien

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## Bilal9

Uttara
















Kurmitola Golf Club

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## Bilal9

Banani

















Hatirjheel

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## Bilal9

All images copyrighted as indicated to their respective owners.

Dhaka - starting with the new(ish) cricket stadium





Old Dhaka Airport (Tejgaon Int'l) now used by Armed Forces only





Highway near new Dhaka Airport





National Martyrs Monument (Jatiya Sriti Shoudho)





Hazrat Shahjalal (RA) Int'l (New Dhaka Airport) VGJR





Narayanganj (Fatulla) Stadium





Nirjhar Residential Area





CTG Shah Amanat (RA) Int'l

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## Bilal9

Some more shots of CTG and CXB.

All images copyrighted as indicated to their respective owners.

Mouth of the Karnaphuli River and Naval Training Academy - ships seen are all local river transports.









Vatiari Army training center





Puthia Rajbari





Cox's Bazaar beach and seashore hotels

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## Bilal9

Get a load of the presentation from Dhaka North City Corporation about our present Dhaka and the promised future. Ignore the tacky music and political propaganda.

I dug the public toilet comment (at 4:40) from some guy 'Unnoto-maner (high-grade) bathroom kora hoisey'. LOL 

Lots of tall promises, but I like Anisul Huq, regardless of political affiliation. He may be actually able to pull off some of these...


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## Bilal9

Further in Dhaka Urban development, DNCC is taking a page from Seoul and installing a central control room to monitor activity in all areas using 500 CCTV cameras - the work will be completed and is underway. Seoul currently has 800 CCTV cameras and controls them using a central control entity.

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## Bilal9

Moghbazar-Mouchak Flyover Opens - still some cleanup needed...

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## Roybot

Elephants allowed on the bridge? 

This sorta stuff is so unique to sub continent.

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## Bilal9

Roybot said:


> View attachment 314016
> 
> 
> Elephants allowed on the bridge?
> 
> This sorta stuff is so unique to sub continent.



They were doing special pinpoint load testing for flaws in the structure. The mahout has a piezo transducer and a pressure readout. You bet your peanuts that this is unique in the subcontinent. However only we possess the technology....

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## Bilal9



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## Bilal9

Visualizations of revamps planned by our new Dhaka North Mayor - Anisul Huq. Lots of similarities with recent revamps in Seoul, South Korea (there are reasons), though on a much more limited scale...

Conversion/reversion of waterway along Panthopath (Sunset Way)





Revamp (greening) of Gulshan-2 Circle





Gulshan Lake (currently under construction)





New Sidewalk designs





Gulshan Central Park











Gulshan-2 Civic Complex (current site of DCC Market) to be turned into DNCC HQ





Images courtesy of Jason Kazi/Amra Dhaka

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## Michael Corleone

Bilal9 said:


> Moghbazar-Mouchak Flyover Opens - still some cleanup needed...


Such a fucking waste. Most of the space under the bridge is taken by the pillars and the roads are becoming bazaar under the bridge. Fucking cumsluts



Bilal9 said:


> Visualizations of revamps planned by our new Dhaka North Mayor - Anisul Huq. Lots of similarities with recent revamps in Seoul, South Korea (there are reasons), though on a much more limited scale...
> 
> Conversion/reversion of waterway along Panthopath (Sunset Way)
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Revamp (greening) of Gulshan-2 Circle
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Gulshan Lake (currently under construction)
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> New Sidewalk designs
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Gulshan Central Park
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Gulshan-2 Civic Complex (current site of DCC Market) to be turned into DNCC HQ
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Images courtesy of Jason Kazi/Amra Dhaka


Anisul huq is a good guy. He can do stuff given the power and money.


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## Avisheik

Most of those open waterways, canals, will be turned into open sewage. We need to modify our cultural mindset and our behavior before building these stuffs. 




Mohammed Khaled said:


> Such a fucking waste. Most of the space under the bridge is taken by the pillars and the roads are becoming bazaar under the bridge. *Fucking cumsluts*



Best no context insult in this thread

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## Bilal9

Avisheik said:


> Most of those open waterways, canals, will be turned into open sewage. We need to modify our cultural mindset and our behavior before building these stuffs.
> 
> Best no context insult in this thread



Yes these have to be maintained, but the canal was originally there as part of Dhaka's system of waterways which was filled in. It helps in removing flood waters.

The idea (I'm almost 90% sure) came from Seoul's canal *Cheonggyecheon*

Here's what Cheonggyecheon looked like in the 1950's






This is what it looked like in the 1980's (covered over and a flyover built on top)





This is what it looks like today as part of Seoul's urban renewal plan

















The Grand plan is to make Hatirjheel look like this eventually - but on a much bigger scale of course.

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## Michael Corleone

Avisheik said:


> Most of those open waterways, canals, will be turned into open sewage. We need to modify our cultural mindset and our behavior before building these stuffs.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Best no context insult in this thread


:p


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## Saiful Islam

Bilal9 said:


> Yes these have to be maintained, but the canal was originally there as part of Dhaka's system of waterways which was filled in. It helps in removing flood waters.
> 
> The idea (I'm almost 90% sure) came from Seoul's canal *Cheonggyecheon*
> 
> Here's what Cheonggyecheon looked like in the 1950's
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> This is what it looked like in the 1980's (covered over and a flyover built on top)
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> This is what it looks like today as part of Seoul's urban renewal plan
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> The Grand plan is to make Hatirjheel look like this eventually - but on a much bigger scale of course.




Man I need to hit the East Asian countries.

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## Bilal9

Saiful Islam said:


> Man I need to hit the East Asian countries.



You will love Seoul which is quite modern now. Level of English comprehension has also come up much higher in the present generation.


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## Bilal9

__________________________________________________________________________

12:00 AM, June 26, 2016 / LAST MODIFIED: 01:49 AM, June 28, 2016

*UTTARA-MOTIJHEEL*
*In 37 minutes*
*Construction of metro rail begins today






Tawfique Ali
*
Construction work of the first metro rail service in the capital begins today with an aim to open half of the 20km metro line by the end of 2019.

A formal commencement of ground development for a depot begins today. The depot is the foremost component to be in place for building the metro rail service system, as metro trains will be launched on the elevated lines from the depot, said Md Mofazzel Hossain, project director of Dhaka Mass Rapid Transit Development Project.

The entire metro rail route will be elevated and all 16 stations will be elevated as well. Only the depot will be on the ground.

A Japanese firm Tokyo Construction Ltd is carrying out the depot land development work, which the Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is scheduled to inaugurate at Bangabandhu International Conference Centre today.

Dhaka Mass Rapid Transit Development Project, official name of the metro rail scheme, stretches from Uttara to Motijheel.

It has purchased 22 hectares of Rajuk land in north Uttara, paying Tk 328 crore, for the depot, which will be the maintenance and resting place for metro rail.

The Tk 22,000 crore ($2.5 billion) ambitious metro rail project is expected to provide an improved, safe, faster and affordable but modern means of urban public transport service significantly reducing the perennial traffic congestion in the capital and prevent environmental pollution, said eminent transport engineering expert Prof Shamsul Hoque.

With every metro rail train comprising six air-conditioned spacious cars, a city commuter will travel between Motijheel and north Uttara in 37 minutes and there will be a train in every four minutes at each of the 16 stations on the way in both directions, said Mofazzel.

A total of 24 trains will together transfer 60,000 passengers every hour on both directions, he said.

The metro rail would be noise-free, with noise barriers and vibration-free lines, and the cars would be made of stainless steel and aluminium alloy, he said.

The metro will save Bangladesh an annual economic loss of Tk 200 billion equivalent to 1.5 percent of the country's gross domestic production, according to a former Jica country representative in Bangladesh.

Currently, city commuters spend several hours to travel from Uttara to Motijheel in snail-pace traffic.

Once the ground development is done, second part of building metro rail will begin on the depot premises by March next year, with the construction of a workshop, yard, train trial lines, training centres, metro rail company headquarters, electricity substation, washing plant, medical centre and metro operation control centre, said Mofazzel.

Contracts would be signed by February, he said.

Simultaneously, the tender process for the third and fourth part of building a 10km elevated viaduct (overpass) and metro stations, from the depot to Agargaon through Pallabi, would begin by April next year.

A five-km elevated viaduct from the depot to Pallabi and four stations would be under the third part, he said, adding that the fourth part would be of another five km viaduct and five stations.

Early last year, Mofazzel had said that this would start by end of this year.

A 10km metro rail service, including five km from the depot to Pallabi and another five from Pallabi to Agargaon will be ready for operation by the end of 2019, and the following year, the entire 20km metro system will ready for use.

The entire project is being implemented under eight separate contracts, including four for building the 20km elevated overpass.

The 16 stations would be in north Uttara, Pallabi, Mirpur, Kazipara, Sheorapara, Agargaon, Rokeya Sarani, Bijoy Sarani, Farmgate, Karwan Bazar, Shahbagh, Dhaka University, Bangladesh Secretariat and Motijheel. 

The fifth part will be on the construction of a viaduct and stations from Agargaon to Karwan Bazar and the sixth on similar construction from Karwan Bazar to Motijheel.

The seventh will be electrical and mechanical work and the eighth procurement of 144 metro rail cars. Procurement of 24 locomotives and the cars will go on simultaneously and be delivered by the second half of 2019, said Mofazzel.

Pre-qualified bidders for car procurement will drop tenders this August and contracts will be signed in January next year.

The project formalised as Dhaka Mass Rapid Transit, otherwise known as Mass Rapid Transit (identified as MRT line-6 in the Strategic Transport Plan), is being implemented by government-owned Dhaka Mass Transit Company Ltd while Dhaka Transport Coordination Authority is supervising.

Consultants, having experience in building New Delhi, Hyderabad, Jakarta, Bangkok metro rails, are applying their knowledge in developing Dhaka metro rail, Mofazzel said.

A consortium of consultants, led by Nippon Koei Ltd of Japan and including Nippon Koei India Ltd, Delhi Metro Rail Corporation Ltd, Mott MacDonald Ltd India, Mott MacDonald Ltd UK and Development Design Consultants Ltd Bangladesh, was hired in November 2013 for general consultancy. They are taking care of the project's design, construction supervision, procurement support and management of work.

The Japanese government through Jica will provide Tk 16,600 crore of the project's total cost as soft loan while Bangladesh government will provide the rest.

TRAFFIC PLAN
The city dwellers have to prepare for a difficult time during the construction of the viaducts, which would be on the existing city streets. Things would be particularly bad during relocation of utility service lines, said Mofazzel.

Traffic management during the construction of elevated viaduct along the busy and crammed Dhaka streets will be the biggest challenge, he said.

As part of the traffic management, two lanes on each side of a street will remain open for traffic and traffic will also be diverted through Mirpur-1 and Shatth-foot street via Shyamoli towards Agargaon Radio Station, he said.

Besides, they will request Mirpur cantonment authorities to allow more public transport vehicles through the cantonment area.

Construction materials will be mobilised only at the dead of night, Mofazzel.

PROGRESS MADE
Since 2013, the topographical survey, traffic demand survey, geotechnical survey, basic design, detailed design (for tender and implementation), environmental survey, right of way survey and survey for any historical and archaeological sites along the metro route have been completed, said the project director.

The geo-technical examinations have been completed. The 120 borehole soil tests along the proposed alignment was required to know soil condition on which detailed design and construction of metro stations and elevated viaduct were dependent.

Relocation of utility service lines of around a dozen private and government organisations, including DPDC/Desco, Titas Gas, Dhaka Wasa, Dhaka City Corporations and BTCL, begins next month.

The organogram of around 1,700 employees of DMTC that will own and operate the metro service is ready for approval. Formulation of a recruitment plan is also underway.

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## Bilal9



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## Bilal9



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## bluesky

Bilal9 said:


> They were doing special pinpoint load testing for flaws in the structure. The mahout has a piezo transducer and a pressure readout. You bet your peanuts that this is unique in the subcontinent. However only we possess the technology....



I really do not understand this method. I think, the elephant was taken over a flyover because the normal roads are busy.


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## Bilal9

Dhaka Elevated Expressway work ongoing in Uttara





BRAC University, Savar





Savar Golf Course





Purbachal Highway (Purbachal is a major Eastern suburb of Dhaka being built)

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## Bilal9

Airport Road / Airport Village (Holiday Inn/Intercontinental/Shopping/Offices under construction)





Jashimuddin Avenue, Uttara





Uttara Third Phase Government Apartment Buildings





Dhaka Airport





Nirjhor Residential Area





Army Golf Club

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## Bilal9

Asian Town duplex project - Purbachal























*Current Status




*
Almost all images in the past four posts courtesy of Jason Kazi



bluesky said:


> I really do not understand this method. I think, the elephant was taken over a flyover because the normal roads are busy.



Ha ha I was joking brother...

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## Bilal9



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## Bilal9

Kids having a good time with Cosplay at this year's Comicon at Dhaka

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## Bilal9

More Comicon pictures...I don't know diddly about Manga, but the Manga themes seem to be pretty pervasive in here...

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## Homo Sapiens

Bilal9 said:


> BRAC University, Savar
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Savar Golf Course
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Purbachal Highway (Purbachal is a major Eastern suburb of Dhaka being built)





Bilal9 said:


> Airport Road / Airport Village (Holiday Inn/Intercontinental/Shopping/Offices under construction)
> 
> Dhaka Airport
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Nirjhor Residential Area
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Army Golf Club


I find it hard to believe that a city like this beautiful landscape is being shunned as the least livable city in the world.

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## UKBengali

Doyalbaba said:


> I find it hard to believe that a city like this beautiful landscape is being shunned as the least livable city in the world.



It is mainly due to the inadequate transportation system in the city.

Wait till all the flyovers and metro is built and then you will see Dhaka
move up many places.

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## Bilal9

Doyalbaba said:


> I find it hard to believe that a city like this beautiful landscape is being shunned as the least livable city in the world.



It's all propaganda Doyal Bhai, at one point both Bangkok and Jakarta looked far worse.....

In any case - we have to build outward, and in a well-planned way (with minimal planned _setbacks_)

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## Bilal9



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## Maira La

Doyalbaba said:


> I find it hard to believe that a city like this beautiful landscape is being shunned as the least livable city in the world.



Western definition of "livable" is different from ours. They won't get the "nightlife" they crave for in our cities. So.. less livable. ; )
Things like pollution and garbage need to be brought under control, though.

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## ~Phoenix~



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## Riyad

2nd phase of *8 km long Moghbazar-Malibagh flyover* has been inaugurated for traffic recently.
Moghbazar intersection is the most jam packed area of Dhaka.

This project is majorly funded by Saudi Arabia. Rest is funded by BD govt.






1st phase was opened in March this year.

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## ~Phoenix~



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## Rokto14

Bilal9 said:


>



Really good project! I would like to see more of these projects popping up in Dhaka city. That's how Dhaka can be more green

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## Bilal9

New Borak tower under construction in the Hatirjheel lakefront area






Two more images of another Borak project - across from the Westin hotel in Gulshan









Factory under construction near Sonargaon - Interesting because the design utilizes earthquake-proofing in the form of diagonal cross-braces.

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## Bilal9

T DESIGN

LOCATION: BOYRARCHALA, GAZIPUR
ARCHITECT: BINYASH
OWNER: T-DESIGN LIMITED
USE: SWEATER FACTORY
LAND: 77.4 KATHA/ 55728 SFT
HEIGHT: 80 FEET
TOTAL BUILT AREA: 162,842 SFT APPROX.
CONSTRUCTION STARTED: 2014
MATERIAL: GLASS, CONCRETE, STEEL, ALUMINIUM


‘Basic and Functional’ were the keywords that influenced the design of this building. The requirement for an unimpeded floor space for facilitating the most functional machine and equipment layout was absolutely necessary.

The land was not large enough to meet the requirements horizontally, so the building was vertically expanded. Separate office building, utility building and factory building gives the character of a complex. A large setback and a detached reception block managed to scale down the structure, providing a welcoming approach.

Safety of the workers has been ensured by providing three proper fire stairs for immediate exit during emergencies and a service road around the building for accessibility. The north-south orientation of the building facilitates natural ventilation. Large glazed surface lets in the day light into the floor space.













*----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------*


*CONTINENTAL APPARELS*

LOCATION: TEJGAON INDUSTRIAL AREA

ARCHITECT: BINYASH

OWNER: HABIBUR RAHMAN TEXTILES LIMITED

USE: WOVEN FACTORY

LAND: 1900 SQM

HEIGHT: 37.55 METERS (G+8)

TOTAL BUILT AREA: 10000 SQM APPROX.

DESIGN COMPLETED: 2012

RAJUK APPROVAL: 2013

MATERIAL: GLASS, CONCRETE, STEEL, ALUMINIUM



An industrial project deals with a large number of workers associated with the function of the building. The aim was to provide an efficient workplace as well as breakoutpoints where anyone can take a tranquil moment from the daily work routine. The interior height and a climatically responsive façade system ensure comfortable workin conditions.

The building is facing dense green on the front side. The overlooking and translucent envelope of the building complements the dense green at the BTCL compound in fron.

The terraces also help create a connection with its surroundings. Stairs are designed and placed to ensure the safe exit of worker during any kind of fire hazard. A service road around the building ensures proper accessibility. The Continental Apparels factory building aims to set an example amidst the deplorable architectural condition that exists explicitly in the garments industry around Bangladesh.













*-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------*


*GOLDEN REFIT GARMENTS LTD*

LOCATION: MAONA, GAZIPUR

ARCHITECT: BINYASH

OWNER: GOLDEN REFIT GARMENTS LTD

USE: SWEATER FACTORY

LAND: 4278.74 SQM

HEIGHT: G + 7/ 37.5 METER

BASEMENT: 01 NOS

TOTAL BUILT AREA: 21497 SQM APPROX.

DESIGN COMPLETED: 2013

CONSTRUCTION STARTED: 2013

MATERIAL: GLASS, CONCRETE, BRICK



The export- oriented garment factory GRGL intended to extend their production capacity by setting up their new production unit. The problem of ventilation was identified at the design stage. Due to the presence of dust particles, we needed to separate the air flow between functional zones.

A new concept was developed to get fresh air from the roof through a set of three wind shafts on three sides. Another side was left for placing the exhaust fans. These wind shafts are complemented by huge suction fans to bring the wind inside the ducts.









BRAC Center for Development Management, Rajendrapur, Bangladesh

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## Hasan89

Nice, keep them coming. We need to build more outside Dhaka as its having too much on the city itself. Outside Dhaka build more factories and offices.

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## Bilal9

Jamuna Future Park Mall images (currently one of largest in South Asia by sq. ft. area and 11th largest in the world)






One of the seven different domes where corridors meet for the eight floors...

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## Bilal9

More Jamuna Mall images...early pictures of the kiddies' merry-go-'round'.....






Tabaq Coffee inside Jamuna Future Park












More pictures of their recent expansion...they claim the best roasted coffee flavors in town and rightfully so.....you don't need a moonbucks or starbucks name to brew righteous coffee, Bangladeshis don't give a hoot, and same with big fast food chains......flipping a burger is not rocket science....
















Uttara third phase mega project latest status

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## TopCat

Design of iconic tower





@Bilal9 @damiendehorn @Mohammed Khaled @bluesky @Phoenix89 @Species

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## idune

TopCat said:


> Design of iconic tower
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> @Bilal9 @damiendehorn @Mohammed Khaled @bluesky @Phoenix89 @Species



M A Muhit friend and owner of a medicine shop will make 100 story tower and that is what gullible idiots are promoting in Bangladesh.


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## TopCat

idune said:


> M A Muhit friend and owner of a medicine shop will make 100 story tower and that is what gullible idiots are promoting in Bangladesh.



Design looks beautiful.. isn't it?
I liked it. @bd_4_ever


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## idune

here is a mall in Taiwan....what being boasted by some folks does not have any idea world outside their coupe.








TopCat said:


> Design looks beautiful.. isn't it?
> I liked it. @bd_4_ever



that is crappy design, in bangla pure "kheet".

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## Michael Corleone

TopCat said:


> Design of iconic tower
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> @Bilal9 @damiendehorn @Mohammed Khaled @bluesky @Phoenix89 @Species


that's not a skyscraper... that's a spaceship! i am surprised... such a design withstanding high winds would definitely be impressive.... who's designing it? SMO or bangladeshi engineers with in house team?


why do i feel like this is impossible to design structurally?


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## TopCat

Mohammed Khaled said:


> that's not a skyscraper... that's a spaceship! i am surprised... such a design withstanding high winds would definitely be impressive.... who's designing it? SMO or bangladeshi engineers with in house team?
> 
> 
> why do i feel like this is impossible to design structurally?


This is tubular shape and easier to design for a skyscrapper. 
I like the blending the theme of eastern and western concept.

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## Michael Corleone

TopCat said:


> This is tubular shape and easier to design for a skyscrapper.
> I like the blending the theme of eastern and western concept.


i wouldn;t trust a render until i see proof or infomation about who are designing this tower? or related with the construction... is it the usuals skimore merills and owings or is it some chinese firm in design work... or is it designed by some bengali engineer himself.... until then... a render doesnt really count my approval of legitimate proof


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## Bilal9

Mohammed Khaled said:


> i wouldn;t trust a render until i see proof or infomation about who are designing this tower? or related with the construction... is it the usuals skimore merills and owings or is it some chinese firm in design work... or is it designed by some bengali engineer himself.... until then... a render doesnt really count my approval of legitimate proof



This is not an orthodox design for skyscraper. And that's the nicest thing I can say about it. What's with the coke bottle shapes??

Reminds me more of this Aladdin thing....

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## damiendehorn

Bilal9 said:


> This is not an orthodox design for skyscraper. And that's the nicest thing I can say about it. What's with the coke bottle shapes??
> 
> Reminds me more of this Aladdin thing....



I know it looks comical. Never going to be built ever.....it's a joke.

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## Russell

It doesnt look comical...it actually looks kinda cool.

But, it is as likely to get built as Pakistanis are of admitting the genocidal rape spree their army went on during '71.

For those still confused, that would be - ZERO.


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## Homo Sapiens

Bilal9 said:


> Jamuna Future Park Mall images (currently one of largest in South Asia by sq. ft. area and 11th largest in the world)
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> One of the seven different domes where corridors meet for the eight floors...


Is there any plan for expansion of JFP?
When it was under construction,it's gross leasable are were shown 4.1 million sq. feet and 3rd largest in the world.Now it's gross leasable area is showing only 1.6 million sq. feet and ranking gone down to 78th! So what happened?


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## TopCat

Russell said:


> It doesnt look comical...it actually looks kinda cool.
> 
> But, it is as likely to get built as Pakistanis are of admitting the genocidal rape spree their army went on during '71.
> 
> For those still confused, that would be - ZERO.


There is no project as profitable as when it is backed by government.
Not sure about the design but it will get built whatever the final design is.

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## Homo Sapiens

TopCat said:


> There is no project as profitable as when it is backed by government.
> Not sure about the design but it will get built whatever the final design is.


This could be a great symbol of Dhaka.In one stroke it will enhance the image of Dhaka to the world in a big way.Like the same way Petronas tower did for Kuala Lampur or Burj-al-khalifa for Dubai.

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## Michael Corleone

Bilal9 said:


> This is not an orthodox design for skyscraper. And that's the nicest thing I can say about it. What's with the coke bottle shapes??
> 
> Reminds me more of this Aladdin thing....

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## SajjLad

Doyalbaba said:


> This could be a great symbol of Dhaka.In one stroke it will enhance the image of Dhaka to the world in a big way.Like the same way Petronas tower did for Kuala Lampur or Burj-al-khalifa for Dubai.



We should focus more on transport and fixing the pollution in Dhaka before any sort of major monument, no one will come see it if it's unreachable and in an inhospitable location.


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## Bilal9

Doyalbaba said:


> Is there any plan for expansion of JFP?
> When it was under construction,it's gross leasable are were shown 4.1 million sq. feet and 3rd largest in the world.Now it's gross leasable area is showing only 1.6 million sq. feet and ranking gone down to 78th! So what happened?



I believe they will expand it in phases.....


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## Mage

SajjLad said:


> We should focus more on transport and fixing the pollution in Dhaka before any sort of major monument, no one will come see it if it's unreachable and in an inhospitable location.


If it gets built...it will take 8-10 years. The transportation system will have improved by then. Metro rails and BRT services will be fully operational. 

Now if you wait 8-10 years before start building a monument like this...it will take 10 more years to complete. So, I guess taking an initiative like this now is the right move. But I think the chances of it getting built is rather low.

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## Bilal9

Nevada FS Cosmo





*BFIDC Tower, 243 Tejgaon-Gulshan Link Rd*

16 storied green building with solar panels and rainwater harvesting

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## Bilal9

New shots of Nirjhor residential area....



























SENA MALANCHA Auditorium





Metrorail latest update - Uttara Depot piling and soil improvement progressing...sorry Bengali only






Padma Bridge Approach Road (Sorry Bengali Only)

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## Bilal9

Jamuna future park mall (at one time the largest mall in South Asia) - campus expansion.....









Shots of the mall interior....











Future Fitness Gym, Jamuna Future Park








Centre court

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## Bilal9

Liberation War Museum moved to its new venue in Dhaka's newer Agargaon Government Campus area....























Some interior shots....































More here,

https://www.panoramio.com/photo/134533650

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## Bilal9

Unnamed Navana Real Estate project at Shahjadpur...








Navana Tranquility (residential project at Gulshan)








Unnamed Navana project at Lalmatia











NAVANA ORNELLO





Unnamed Navana project at Khulshi, Chittagong

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## Bilal9

Hatirjhil Restaurants and Amphitheater. Yet to open for public. 










This photo is from the rooftop of Picasso Restaurant.

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## Bilal9

Some Dhaka urban images courtesy of MirzaZeehan,

Banani










Gulshan















Kakrail





Naya Paltan















Tejgoan-Gulshan Link Road





Ramna










Regent Airways has grown - from being the new kid on the block next to GMG and United BD as the competition against Bangladesh's state operator - to become the only private Bangladeshi airline offering a real alternative to Biman on routes like Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur and Singapore. S2-AHC is a B737-700NG series bird.

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## TopCat

I dont know but most buildings are ugly and of bad taste. Just not my type of work. look at this


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## Nabil365

TopCat said:


> I dont know but most buildings are ugly and of bad taste. Just not my type of work. look at this


As if you can afford to buy it


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## TopCat

Nabil365 said:


> As if you can afford to buy it


You mean I live under a tree?


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## Nabil365

TopCat said:


> You mean I live under a tree?


Not really cause the amount of bribe people in biman takes.


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## TopCat

Nabil365 said:


> Not really cause the amount of bribe people in biman takes.



Biman employees are paid in dollar, a fourth class employee draws more than a lac per month. 
I dont draw from Biman for your info.


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## Mage

*Purbachal New Town 'to be ready by 2018'*





A walled plot of land . Photo: Zahid I Khan
Ainul Haque Pramanik
The Rajdhani Unnayan Kartripakkha is planning to complete the development works of Purbachal New Town project by the end of next year.

Around 80 percent of the land development work has been completed. Possession of some 13,000 plots out of the total 25,016 has been handed over to allottees, said Rajuk officials.

“We have already spent around Tk 2,700 crore to step up the implementation of the project,” ASM Raihanul Ferdous, chief engineer of Rajuk, told The Daily Star.

However, the city planner is conducting feasibility studies on the project's water treatment and waste management plants.


It is implementing the Tk 7,700 crore project on around 6,000 acres of land to create residential accommodation for around 1.5 million people.

The Rajuk had conducted a feasibility study on the project around 26 years ago. In 1992, it started acquiring land for the project and the development work began in 2007.

Purbachal New Town is located between the Shitalakhya and the Balu rivers in Rupganj of Narayanganj and Kaliganj of Gazipur.

The project area is divided into 30 sectors, with 21.66 percent for commercial, educational and sporting institutions, 25.90 percent for road, island and footpath and 13.70 percent for lakes, parks and forest, the chief engineer said.

Ujjwal Mallick, additional director of the project, blamed the slow implementation of the project on sluggish acquisition of land. According to him, it took Rajuk about 16 years to do the job.





A completely-built road, in Purbachal New Town project. Plot owners' wait to move into their land could end next year as about 80 percent of the development work has been done. The photos were taken recently. Photo: Zahid I Khan
“We have already installed overhead electricity cables in the project area to supply power to 13,000 plots,” he said.

About supply of gas, Raihan said an LPG (liquefied petroleum gas) bank would be set up in each of the 30 sectors to supply bottled LPG to households. 

Development of lakes, canals, internal road, drains and installation of street lamps were underway, the Rajuk official added.

Bangladesh Navy has been tasked with the construction of 62 bridges in the project area. Of them, 30 have already been built and two are under construction.

The project area is linked to the capital by a 300-feet expressway which is connected to the Airport Road via Pragati Sarani intersection.

Ujjwal said many businesses and government offices, like the headquarters of Fire Service and Civil Defence, would be relocated to Purbachal.

Two police lines and four police stations will be set up at some strategic points in the town to maintain law and order.

The government has planned to build 142-storey Iconic Tower on 75 acres of land in Purbachal. The building will have an international convention centre and a modern sports complex, among other facilities.

The Rajuk official said once the project is completed, it would facilitate trade and commerce and create jobs.

Around 144 acres of land have been earmarked by Rajuk for reserved forest. Only 38 percent space of the total project area would be used for housing purpose, he told this correspondent.

Besides, 62,000 flats will be built on 90 acres of land for low income people.

http://www.thedailystar.net/backpage/purbachal-new-town-be-ready-2018-1404832

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## Zhukov

Best of Luck Bangladesh

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## Homo Sapiens

10:42 AM, May 17, 2017 / LAST MODIFIED: 12:14 PM, May 17, 2017
*Hatirjheel-Sonargaon flyover opened*





The 850m section of Moghbazar-Mouchak flyover that connects Hatirjheel to Sonargaon intersection adorned in the color of the national flag of Bangladesh during its opening on May 17, 2017. Photo: Prabir Das
Star Online Report


Another part of the Moghbazar-Mouchak flyover in Dhaka, that connects Hatirjheel to Sonargaon intersection, has been opened to public.





LGRD Minister Khandakar Mosharraf Hossain opened the 850 meter section of the flyover this morning and hoped that it would help ease traffic.

On March 30 last year, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina inaugurated the first part of the flyover that stretched two kilometres from Saatrasta to Shaheed Captain Mansur Ali Avenue.

The total length of the Mouchak-Moghbazar flyover is 8.7 kilometres.





LGRD Minister Khandakar Mosharraf Hossain cutting the ribbon to open the flyover. Photo: Prabir Das
http://www.thedailystar.net/city/hatirjheel-sonargaon-flyover-opened-1406509
@Bilal9

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## Homo Sapiens

Gulshan area views.বাংলা হেডলাইন নিয়া কিছু মনে কইরেন না।








@Bilal9 @UKBengali @Khan saheb @Arefin007 @Philia

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## Bilal9

*3rd terminal at HSIA on cards*
Tk 136.14b project now under scrutiny of PC
FHM Humayan Kabir

The government will build the third terminal at the Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport (HSIA) in Dhaka at a cost of Tk 136.14 billion to handle 12 million passengers by 2025, officials said Saturday.

Officials said the state-run Civil Aviation Authority of Bangladesh (CAAB) recently sent a project proposal in this regard to the Planning Commission (PC) seeking its approval for starting construction works.

"We signed a deal with a Japanese consulting firm last month to help prepare the design for the terminal, float tender and supervise the terminal construction job," Nurul Islam, a Director of the CAAB told the FE.

Tender will be invited shortly for expansion of the HSIA, he added.

Meanwhile, Japanese development partner -- the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) -- has assured Bangladesh of building the runway and developing related infrastructures of the Dhaka airport.

An official said after construction of the 3rd terminal, Bangladesh's largest airport HSIA would be able to handle 12 million passengers and 0.434 million units of cargoes by 2025 against its current capacity of 8.0 million passengers and 0.258 million units of cargoes annually.

"We have sent a Tk 136.14 billion project proposal to the PC. Japan has assured us of providing the major part, amounting to Tk 112.15 billion, of the total cost of the project. Soon after getting approval from the government, we will go for construction works of the Terminal-3," he added.

The construction would not require acquisition of new land.

Currently, the HSIA, which started its operation in 1980, has two old and outmoded terminals where providing world-class services to air passengers is quite difficult.

Besides, the existing facilities of the Dhaka airport could not handle new generation aircraft like B747-8F; and B777-300ER.

A Korea-Singapore-Bangladesh joint venture consulting company has already conducted the feasibility study, updated the Master Plan on HSIA which suggested expanding the airport to meet the growing aircraft flow, a CAAB official said.

The CAAB official said the consulting firm in its study showed that the air traffic growth at HSIA is one of the fastest in Asia requiring a massive upgradation of the airport.

The consulting firm has also prepared the detailed design for the Terminal-3, he added.

"Now the newly-appointed Japanese consulting firm will update the design and necessary other works for the HSIA. It will also prepare a document for inviting tender as soon as possible. The firm will also supervise entire construction work of the Terminal-3," CAAB Director Nurul Islam said.

According to the project proposal, the CAAB will build the 3rd terminal, multi-level car parking with tunnel, new cargo complex, VVIP complex, parking apron at Terminal-3 area, taxiways etc.

The CAAB has taken a target to build the 3rd terminal by June 2022.

A PC official said they are scrutinising the 'Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport expansion project phase-1' of the CAAB.

"If the project is found viable and important for the economy, we will place it before the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC) for getting approval," he added.

*JICA inks $1.59b deal for 6 projects*




JICA will provide Bangladesh a 178.223-billion yen (about $1.59 billion) as loan for six infrastructure projects.

Bangladesh will spend the funds on airport expansion, bridges, mass rapid transit system, power plant, underground power substation and water resources, JICA said on its website.

An agreement has been signed in this regard between the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) and the Bangladesh government.

The six projects are:

expansion of Hazrat Shahjalal (RA) International Airport (US $ 683 million), 
construction and repair of Kanchpur, Meghna and Gumti bridges ($ 469 million), 
development of a mass rapid transit system in Dhaka ($ 49.8 million), 
Matarbari coal-fired power plant ($ 95.6 million), 
construction of an underground power substation in Dhaka ($182 million) and 
a water resources development project ($ 105.5 million).

JICA said it will continue to support efforts in Bangladesh to remove barriers to further economic growth and overcome social vulnerability.

The concessional loans are to be repaid in 30 years, with a grace period of 10 years.

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## Homo Sapiens



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## Bilal9

Courtesy of Jason Kazi
*
Army Welfare Trust Housing Project, Baunia*

By Shanta Holdings Ltd.(Developer)

Facilities include: Gated community, Community clubhouse, Swimming pool, school, restaurant, mosque, amphitheater, cafe and boating lake, clinic, tennis courts, volleyball courts, fitness center, sports complex, large playgrounds, central water body









































*Shanta The Eltanin, UN Road, Baridhara*
9 storied 3995-7920 sq. ft. unit apartment building with 2 levels of underground parking, landscaping, children's playground, gymnasium, rooftop swimming pool, waiting room for drivers and guard's quarters.
*








Shanta La Bijou, Rd 1, Baridhara*

9 storied 4150 sq. ft. unit apartment building with 2 underground levels for parking, landscaping, children's play area, management area with powder room, rooftop gymnasium, rooftop party space, rooftop landscaping and waiting room for drivers

*



*

*



*

*



*

*



*

*



*

*Shanta Nawratan, Bailey Road*

40 unit apartment complex with 2 underground levels for parking






*South Breeze South Park, North Gulshan*

10 storied

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## Homo Sapiens

@Bilal9

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## Homo Sapiens

@Bilal9 @Species @Khan saheb @Philia @bluesky

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## Bilal9

Doyalbaba said:


> @Bilal9 @Species @Khan saheb @Philia @bluesky



Great animation and plan, but boat and yacht quays (marinas) are typically inside an enclosed breakwater (outer wall) and not open to the ocean. This is so tidal surges cant damage boats.






Piers are open to the ocean but very high (over twenty feet height) and cannot be used as boat quays. There are differences which the animator needs to know.

Here is Santa Monica pier,

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## Homo Sapiens

Home City
12:00 AM, July 12, 2017 / LAST MODIFIED: 02:24 AM, July 12, 2017
*Ecnec approves Tk 3,250cr expressway for Cittagong airport*

Staff Correspondent

*A 16.5-kilometre elevated expressway connecting Hazrat Shah Amanat International Airport with Lalkhan Bazar-Muradpur flyover has been approved for Chittagong city.*


*The four-lane expressway with a price tag of Tk 3,250 crore was approved yesterday by the Ecnec (Executive Committee of the National Economic Council) in a bid to ease traffic congestion and reduce travel time to and from the airport in the country's second largest city. *


*As part of this project, by 2020, the under construction flyover from Muradpur to Lalkhan Bazar will be extended upto the airport, explained a planning ministry official.*

The planning ministry in its proposal argued for the new expressway by mentioning that around 40 lakh people now live in Chittagong -- the country's prime export-import hub. With nearly one lakh inhabitants being added to the population each year, the city's traffic situation is worsening day by day.

Meanwhile, during yesterday's meeting, the Ecnec turned down a proposal for the development of Jagannath University (JnU) in the capital.


Planning Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal following the meeting said while presiding over the meeting, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, chairperson of the Ecnec, issued a directive asking to build a complete campus for the JnU at Keraniganj near the capital with all necessary amenities including residential halls.

Nasrul Hamid, state minister for power, energy and mineral resources, was given a week for the task of finding and informing the planning ministry of a suitable piece of land at Keraniganj for the JnU campus, said a planning ministry official.

The Ecnec yesterday gave its nod to a total of nine projects -- including the elevated expressway in Chittagong -- worth Tk 6,393 crores.
http://www.thedailystar.net/city/ecnec-approves-tk-3250cr-expressway-ctg-airport-1431790
@Bilal9 @Species @Philia @Khan saheb

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## Arthur

Doyalbaba said:


> Home City
> 12:00 AM, July 12, 2017 / LAST MODIFIED: 02:24 AM, July 12, 2017
> *Ecnec approves Tk 3,250cr expressway for Cittagong airport*
> 
> Staff Correspondent
> 
> *A 16.5-kilometre elevated expressway connecting Hazrat Shah Amanat International Airport with Lalkhan Bazar-Muradpur flyover has been approved for Chittagong city.*
> 
> 
> *The four-lane expressway with a price tag of Tk 3,250 crore was approved yesterday by the Ecnec (Executive Committee of the National Economic Council) in a bid to ease traffic congestion and reduce travel time to and from the airport in the country's second largest city. *
> 
> 
> *As part of this project, by 2020, the under construction flyover from Muradpur to Lalkhan Bazar will be extended upto the airport, explained a planning ministry official.*
> 
> The planning ministry in its proposal argued for the new expressway by mentioning that around 40 lakh people now live in Chittagong -- the country's prime export-import hub. With nearly one lakh inhabitants being added to the population each year, the city's traffic situation is worsening day by day.
> 
> Meanwhile, during yesterday's meeting, the Ecnec turned down a proposal for the development of Jagannath University (JnU) in the capital.
> 
> 
> Planning Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal following the meeting said while presiding over the meeting, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, chairperson of the Ecnec, issued a directive asking to build a complete campus for the JnU at Keraniganj near the capital with all necessary amenities including residential halls.
> 
> Nasrul Hamid, state minister for power, energy and mineral resources, was given a week for the task of finding and informing the planning ministry of a suitable piece of land at Keraniganj for the JnU campus, said a planning ministry official.
> 
> The Ecnec yesterday gave its nod to a total of nine projects -- including the elevated expressway in Chittagong -- worth Tk 6,393 crores.
> http://www.thedailystar.net/city/ecnec-approves-tk-3250cr-expressway-ctg-airport-1431790
> @Bilal9 @Species @Philia @Khan saheb


Good. But in my opinion they should invest in metro rails & subways, instead of these giant monstrosities, that eats up the roads underneath it.

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## Homo Sapiens

Khan saheb said:


> Good. But in my opinion they should invest in metro rails & subways, instead of these giant monstrosities, that eats up the roads underneath it.


I think metro rail project in Chittagong will be undertaken after completion of current metro work in Dhaka.Govt. will not step towards a second metro when first one is still incomplete.But I think,this elevated expressway is also necessary.VIP foreigners certainly will not ride to metro or those who drive their own car.Access to airport should be maintain by multiple means.

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## Homo Sapiens



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## Bilal9

New pictures courtesy of Jason Kazi....






Bashundhara Group Mansion





Mosque/Madrasa under construction, Bashundhara





Bashundhara Group Workers Community





Bashundhara Group Mansion





Bashundhara Group Mansion





Baridhara Central Park





Hatirjheel / Tejgaon-Gulshan Link Rd Area










Gulshan Lake Ghat





Gulshan-1 near Circle





Gulshan-2 North near Park





Gulshan-2 near Pink City





Six Seasons Hotel rooftop





Dutch Club

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## Bilal9

Hatirjheel area









Gulshan Residential Area









































Tejgaon








Karwan Bazaar











Dhanmandi

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## Bilal9

Airport road to Uttara model town
























Uttara

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## Bilal9

Dhaka, Bangladesh by ASaber91, on Flickr




Dhaka, Bangladesh by ASaber91, on Flickr




Dhaka, Bangladesh by ASaber91, on Flickr




Dhaka, Bangladesh by ASaber91, on Flickr




Dhaka, Bangladesh by ASaber91, on Flickr




[URL='https://flic.kr/p/Wsiaex']


Dhaka, Bangladesh by ASaber91, on Flickr




Dhaka, Bangladesh by ASaber91, on Flickr[/URL]


*Shanta Forum One, Tejgaon-Gulshan Link Rd*

16 storied level office building with 2 levels of underground parking with 227 spaces

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## Banglar Bir

*Dhaka retains 4th least livable city position in Global Livability Index*

Adil Mahmood
Published at 12:21 AM August 17, 2017





Dhaka, a city of 16m population, has long benn considered as one of the worst managed city in the world *Mahmud Hossain Opu/Dhaka Tribune*
*The city scored 38.7 out of the ideal score of 100, unchanged since 2011*
Dhaka city has retained its fourth least liveable city position among 140 cities in the world in this year’s Global Livability Index.





Infogram
Dhaka is only ahead of Tripoli of Libya, Lagos of Nigeria and Damascus of Syria.

View image on Twitter





Follow

The EIU Cities @TheEIU_Cities
The top 6 shifts in #liveability according to the latest ranking released today: http://eiu.com/liveability #Liveability17

*The capital of Bangladesh moved two steps up last year from 137th to 139th. According to the Economist Intelligence Unit-endorsed index, Dhaka was the second least livable city in the world in 2014 and 2015.*

*The city scored 38.7 out of the ideal score of 100, unchanged from last year’s. Dhaka has stuck in the same score since 2011.

On stability, Dhaka scored 50 while in healthcare, the score is 29.2, culture and environment 43.3, education 41.7 and infrastructure 26.8.*

The rating, part of the Worldwide Cost of Living Survey, quantifies the challenges that might be presented to an individual’s lifestyle across five broad categories of stability, healthcare, culture and environment, education and infrastructure.



The EIU Cities @TheEIU_Cities
#SriLanka #Colombo among biggest improvers during five years: Global Liveability Report http://www.lankabusinessonline.com/colombo-among-biggest-improvers-during-five-years-global-liveability-report/ …#Liveability17




*Colombo among biggest improvers during five years: Global Liveability Report*
Aug 16, 2017 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s main commercial city Colombo is among the five biggest improvers during the last five years in terms of liveability, recently released Global Liveability Report 201…
lankabusinessonline.com

Melbourne in Australia remains the most liveable of the 140 cities surveyed for the seventh consecutive years, followed by the Austria’s Vienna.
http://www.dhakatribune.com/banglad...ast-livable-city-eiu-global-livability-index/


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## Mage

*WB's proposal to develop Dhaka eastward - a critique*
There is need to focus on the basic needs of the people, affordability and pursue economic development policies which would limit the influx of unemployed rural population into Dhaka. The valuable wet land in the east of Dhaka is important for the city's environment. Country's planners should perhaps prepare development plans centring round the divisional headquarters, and make them self-sustaining, writes Abu Reza
The World Bank (WB)-sponsored international conference in Dhaka, held on July 19 last, highlighted the need for a move 'Towards Great Dhaka'. However, many disheartening features of the current conditions in Dhaka City came out to the fore, such as Dhaka City's population has grown from a level of three million in 1980 to about 18m now, of which about 3.5m live in informal settlements (slums), lacking in basic amenities, and the population size may even surge to a level of 35m by 2035. The city's acute traffic congestion ('janjot') is unprecedented. The average driving speed in the city has come down to less than 4.0km per hour from 21km per hour ten years ago - almost a walking speed. Consequently the city loses 3.2 million working hours each day, and cost the economy several billion dollars a year. It has all come to this pass, not overnight but due to lack of right remedies over the decades.

The government had in fact turned to the WB earlier. In response to an official request, the Bank had appraised the Dhaka Urban Transport Project in December 1998. In independent Bangladesh, this represented the first comprehensive attempt towards tackling city's acute traffic congestion problem. The WB approved a $ 234.2m-project with many components, such as 1) Traffic Management, 2) Road Improvements, 3) Bus Route Improvements, 4) Rehabilitation of Bus Terminals, 5) Pedestrian Facilities, 6) NMT Network Improvement, 7) Grade Separated Interchanges, 8) Flood Damage Rehabilitation, 9). Equipment, 10) Technical Assistance and 11) Rehabilitation.

During the mid-term review in February 2002, the Bank revised the scope of the project dropping some components. In consequence, a project estimated originally to cost $ 234.2m, was wrapped up within $ 140.00m, dropping some components like Jatrabari Flyover, and consequently, a precious amount of $ 79.5m fund (almost grant like) was not utilised for the alleviation of the 'Janjot' for which the project was originally designed.

The Bank, however, prepared an Implementation Completion Report in December 2005 in which it admitted flaws in project preparation, saying that a "formal Quality at Entry Assessment was not undertaken", and that "there were significant shortcomings in identification, preparation and appraisal" for the following reasons:

1. "The project was highly complex by involving many different ministries and implementing agencies. …The support for public transport service improvements was inadequate in the project design" 

2. "Poor institutional arrangement -between many agencies"

3. "Weak borrower ownership and commitment" 

4. "Weak leadership at DTCB (now an authority), a crucial body for coordination, was not addressed."

In view of its restructuring, with some components dropped, for the remaining components, the economic rate of return (ERR) computed indicated, in terms of rate of return, a declining trend. It is conceivable that even at mid-life, virtually none of the components implemented was rendering the desired level of services. 

The WB approach was narrowly focused during project preparation, without recognising the basic causes of the city's 'Janjot', such as population influx, and unregulated entry of motorised vehicles, among others. It should have been recognised that Dhaka is surrounded by river and water bodies on all sides, its overall size is finite, its potential road space is limited and, thus, it could not accommodate ever-increasing size of population or number of motorised vehicles. An approach that infrastructure provision alone will tackle Dhaka's 'Janjot' was not proven by the performance of the WB project. 


Against this background of the WB's past intervention and its outcome, it is only logical that the Bank would seek to pick up the pieces and address itself afresh with ideas, and formulate a new project for a functioning capital, which would assuage the distressed Dhaka citizens and inspire hope. Instead, it is extraordinary to hear a WB official to suggest in the July conference that "developing east Dhaka in a sustainable manner was more meaningful than attempting to retrofit the over-built and over-congested Dhaka". To this end, the Bank introduced its draft report 'Towards Great Dhaka: A New Urban Development Paradigm Eastward'. 

It seems that the conference focused on erecting a 'Shanghai' for Dhaka, in the model of its adjoining city of Pudong, which would inevitably cost many billions of dollars. 

WORLD BANK'S DRAFT REPORT CRITICISED: However, Mr. Zhao Qizheng, former vice-mayor of Shanghai, said that "Pudong's experience may be applicable in some parts of China, but it may not be suitable for Bangladesh …". We have to recognise that China is a vast country with a huge population and the size of its gross domestic product (GDP) is the second highest in the world. It holds the world's biggest foreign exchange reserve.

Bangladesh, a low-income country, has limited means. There is need to focus on its basic needs, affordability and pursue economic development policies which would limit the influx of unemployed rural population into Dhaka. The valuable wet land in the east of Dhaka is important for the city's environment. Country's planners should perhaps prepare development plans centring round the divisional headquarters, and make them self-sustaining. This stance would be in conformity with the Prime Minister's avowed objectives of devolution of powers to local authorities who would pursue economic development creating jobs, and set up quality health and education facilities and improve quality of life at the local level. This development stance will have the potential not only to lessen pressure on Dhaka but also to improve governance by taking the government to the door of the people. All these are doable, given political will. 

Dhaka should perhaps emulate the experience of Kolkata. Kolkata's performance, under the jurisdiction of Greater Metropolitan Development Authority, may be an eye-opener. Its population, according to 2011 Indian census, grew, on average, at a rate of 19.9 per cent in 1991; 19 per cent in 2001; and 7-6 per cent in 2011. Kolkata's area within the Municipal Corporation is 185 sq. km. Its population, which was 5.08m in 2009, reduced to 4.5 million in 2011. This outcome, it is claimed, is due to significant policy changes, through land reforms and concentrating in rural-based development work undertaken over a long period. There is a consensus among development experts that combined with improved agriculture production and development of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), instead of implementing mega projects, all around the country, is perhaps clue to the tackling of the country's problem number one, which is unemployment. 

The most important related issue, the former Chief Minister of Delhi Sheila Dixit pointed out in the conference, is one of Dhaka City's effective governance. Perhaps it is high time to introduce the system of city government. Thus a single authority can bring about proper coordination among many agencies, sometimes engaged at cross purposes. Both the Mayors of city corporations concurred with the idea. 

Dr. Abu Reza, a Transport Economist, worked at WB/IDB. 

aburezam@gmail.com.

http://www.thefinancialexpress-bd.c...oposal-to-develop-Dhaka-eastward---a-critique


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## Bilal9

Philia said:


> Dhaka should perhaps emulate the experience of Kolkata. Kolkata's performance, under the jurisdiction of Greater Metropolitan Development Authority, may be an eye-opener.



There is a section of people in Bangladesh who just love Kolkata in spite of the delapidated entity it is. Just my opinion. Just having 'Fuchka' and 'GolGappa' at 11:00 PM in a city does not measure its quality in terms of amenities and services. 

The only 'eye-opener' about Kolkata is that people have left the city in droves to go to other places in India in search of better jobs, amenities and better living conditions. They have that option, hence the negative growth in Kolkata for years, nothing else.

Kolkata cannot be a model for Dhaka.

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## Bilal9

*MIR* *SANARC Rise, Tejgaon Industrial Area




*
Army Welfare Trust Housing Project, Baunia
Being developed by Shanta Holdings Ltd (courtesy of Jason Kazi)

Facilities include: gated community, community clubhouse, swimming pool, school, restaurant, mosque, amphitheater, cafe and boating lake, clinic, tennis courts, volleyball courts, fitness center, sports complex, large playgrounds, central water body
*






































*






*Shanta Lakehouse, UN Road, Baridhara*

9 storied 3,513 sq. ft. unit apartment building with community hall, fitness center, rooftop jacuzzi, green spaces and water features.

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## Banglar Bir

12:00 AM, August 24, 2017 / LAST MODIFIED: 02:50 AM, August 24, 2017
*This also happens*
*3 major bridges being built ahead of time with cost less than estimated*




Piling work for a second bridge going on next to the Meghna Bridge on Dhaka-Chittagong highway. There is a possibility the new, wider bridge would be finished by December 2018, earlier than planned, said the project director. The photo was taken a few days ago. Photo: Anisur Rahman
M Abul Kalam Azad

When all major infrastructure projects are facing delays and cost escalation, the venture to build three new bridges on the Shitalakkhya, Meghna and Gumti rivers is making good progress.

All of them are expected to be completed by the December 2018 deadline, and setting an example, will cost less than what was estimated in the development project proforma (DPP).

Under the project, the existing Kanchpur, Meghna and Meghna-Gumti bridges would also be refurbished, officials of the road transport and bridges ministry said.

The four-lane bridges being built parallel to the old ones would cut short the travel time between Dhaka and Chittagong. The Dhaka-Chittagong highway was expanded into four-lanes last year.

After feasibility study, the cost of the project was estimated at Tk 8,487 crore, of which Japan International Cooperation Agency (Jica) was supposed to provide Tk 6,430 crore.

Before signing deals with four Japanese firms in November 2015, the total cost came down to Tk 7,677 crore due to strong negotiations by the project officials.

"We negotiated item to item and had been able to reduce the costs of many items," Road Transport and Bridges Division Secretary MAN Siddique told The Daily Star.

Project officials said the cost would further decrease as the consultancy fee (Tk 510 crore) and Custom Duty VAT (Tk 1,200 crore) were set to reduce.

The four contractors are Obayshi Corporation, Shimizu Corporation, JFE Engineer Corporation, and IHI Infra Systems Company Ltd.

As per the contract, the Japanese firms started working in January 2016 to build the new bridges. Despite a hiccup after last year's Holey Artisan attack, all foundation work, including piling of the three bridges were almost done.




Several Japanese firms building a new Meghna-Gumti bridge and a new Kanchpur bridge, bellow, on the Dhaka-Chittagong highway. The photos were taken recently. Photo: Anisur Rahman
"Piling work will be completed by October," said Project Director Saidul Haq, also the additional chief engineer of Roads and Highways Department.

He said the Japanese companies were producing steel girders at their factories in Vietnam and Myanmar. "They will start bringing the girders from October."

The length of the second Kanchpur bridge is 397 meters while the length of second Meghna bridge is 930 meters and second Meghna-Gumti bridge 1,410 meters.

This correspondent visited the sites last week and saw Japanese and local workers doing the pilings and other work in the rain. A good number of police and Ansar personnel were seen deployed to ensure round-the-clock security.





MAN Siddique said to complete the new bridges by next year the Japanese firms demanded two things, ensuring fund flow and security of the workers. "We assured them both and the firms are working extra hours to complete the project even before the deadline."

About 90 percent of the country's export-imports are done through the Chittagong Port. A majority of the goods are transported using the highway.

The highway had been widened onwards but the three bridges had become bottlenecks, often causing chaos on the country's economic lifeline.

Two underpasses and an overpass are being built on the eastern side of the Kanchpur bridge for smooth flow of traffic from all directions --Dhaka, Chittagong and Narsingdi (Sylhet).

The Japanese firms would start restoring the old bridges after completing the new bridges.

"The old bridges will be ready by the end of 2019, meaning traffic movement on the vital highway will be faster," Project Director Saidul Haq said.
http://www.thedailystar.net/frontpage/also-happens-1453222

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## Bilal9

*Images of the trains, rail and stations of Dhaka Metro Rail project from DMTC site*

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## Bilal9

Rain soaked Dhaka ....





Dhaka 2017 August by ASaber91, on Flickr




Dhaka 2017 August by ASaber91, on Flickr




Dhaka 2017 August by ASaber91, on Flickr

*The Glass House - one of the newer midrises by Shanta Developments, Gulshan-1*

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## Bilal9

*Eid in Dhaka - roads deserted*






Airport Rd








Airport Rd.

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## Bilal9

*Hatirjheel to house largest dancing fountain*
Abu Hayat Mahmud






Hatirjheel Musical Dancing Fountain will be the *largest colourful water fountain in South Asia*

If you visit one of Dhaka’s leisure spots, Hatirjheel lake, in the evening, you might be treated to an amazing dance of colours and music.

The 1,980 square metre Hatirjheel Musical Dancing Fountain, built in the waters of Hatirjheel lake, is the first dancing water fountain in Bangladesh.

The fountain creates aesthetic designs of different colours and three-dimensional images, achieved by employing the effects of timed sounds and light, including lasers against water particles. The water refracts and reflects the light, and in doing so, produces the images.

Project director of Hatirjheel Integrated Development Project, Major Kazi Shakil Hossain, told the Dhaka Tribune that the dancing fountain is switched on just after sunset every day on a trial basis, and will be launched before the upcoming Bengali new year, possibly on April 13.

“A new theater will also be inaugurated at the same ceremony for the fountain,” Shakil said.

“The Hatirjheel fountain shoots water and different coloured light beams 10-80 metres high, which can be seen from various surrounding locations, including Police Plaza at Gulshan 1, Merul Badda, Modhubagh, and Begunbari,” he said.

He claimed the Hatirjheel Musical Dancing Fountain will be the largest colourful water fountain in South Asia.
According to Guinness World Records, the largest fountain is located in Singapore. Covering 1,683 square metres, the Fountain of Wealth shoots water up to 13 metres high.

However, the Banpo Bridge in Seoul, South Korea, with its illuminated water curtains on both sides, is the world’s longest fountain on a bridge. Both sides of the bridge house has pumps that pass nearly 200 cubic metres of water every minute.

The water comes from the Han River 20 metres below and is illuminated by LED lights before it falls back in the river.

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## Nilgiri

Cherry picking only gets you so far:




\

Hey at least you are improving a tiny bit. Looks like by 2057 you will be around the liveability of Kathmandu in 2007.

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## gslv mk3

Bilal9 said:


> *Images of the trains, rail and stations of Dhaka Metro Rail project from DMTC site*



I thought you were against posting CGI of metro projects. Or do that apply only to the India developing thread ??


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## Mage

Nilgiri said:


> Hey at least you are improving a tiny bit. Looks like by 2057 you will be around the liveability of Kathmandu in 2007.


Nah....by 2050 Dhaka will be above Moscow.

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## Nilgiri

Philia said:


> Nah....by 2050 Dhaka will be above Moscow.



Haha...fair enough.


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## Bilal9

Chittagong, Bangladesh

























Dhaka Elevated Expressway cement deal inked

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## Bilal9

*Shanta The Landing 104, Gulshan-2

Typical Luxury condos in Gulshan area*

22 units at 3300 to 3500 sq. ft. each with lake side corner plot view, 2 underground levels of parking for 44 cars, gymnasium, multipurpose community space, jacuzzi, grand reception, waiting lounge, children's play area, community office with powder room and no parking on ground level

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## Bilal9

New Dhaka shots courtesy of MirzaZeehan.

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## Bilal9

*Banani Commercial Area*

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## Bilal9

*Karwanbazar and Gulshan financial districts*

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## Homo Sapiens

@Bilal9 @Species

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## Species

Homo Sapiens said:


> @Bilal9 @Species



I guess the existing roads in Chittagong needs to be widened if it's going to be elevated. The traffic situation in the city is currently a mess, we are seeing flyovers being constructed one after another but they are of little use. Also, there seem to be a bit of rivalry between CCC and CDA due to some overlapping responsibilities which is seriously hurting the development of the city.

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## Bilal9

DMTC Metro terminal and elevated rights-of-way infrastructure designs finalised...





























































*Current status of depot development work*


























The metro rail (MRT line-6) project is being constructed in eight phases at a cost of Tk. 22,000 crore






_Workers build a frame for the Metro Rail project in the capital’s Uttara Diyabari area on Wednesday *Mehedi Hasan/Dhaka Tribune*_

*The construction progress of the much needed metro rail project (MRT line-6) is continuing apace.*

Minister of Road Transport and Bridges Obaidul Quader, on Wednesday explained that *the initial delay was caused by the terrorist attack on Holy Artisan Bakery last year where several Japanese officials and consultants of the project were killed.*

“Now the construction is progressing at a steady pace. The pillars of the metro rail line will be erected in the next six months and we hope to see the metro rail open in 2019,” said the minister while visiting the project’s depot in Uttara on Wednesday.

*The metro rail project*

The metro rail (MRT line-6) project is being constructed in eight phases at a cost of Tk22,000 crore.

*Currently, the land development and civil work is being done for the depot which are phases one and two, respectively. Around two thirds of the land development work is complete.*

The depot would be home to trains while will have some of them would also house office buildings, workshops, operation centre, washing plant and maintenance wings.

The 19 acres land would be developed at the cost Tk. 56.67 crore and allocation for civil work is Tk. 1,596 crore.

The civil work is being done by the Italian-Thai Development Public Company Limited and Sinohydro Corporation Limited JV and a Tokyo based construction company is developing the depot’s land.

*Italian-Thai Development Public Company Limited might be given the job to build around the 12 kilometre-long viaduct between Uttara to Agargoan and nine stations at the cost of Tk4,230 crore, as per phase three and four.*

The 20.1 kilometre long metro rail (MRT line-1) between Uttara to Motijheel is being constructed under the supervision of Dhaka Mass Rapid Transit Development Company.

MRT line-1 will be able to carry 60,000 passengers every hour, both ways. *The first phase of the project on the Uttara to Agargoan line is set to be completed by 2019. In 2020 the entire project for MRT-6 is set to be complete. *

The metro rail cars for MRT line 6 will come to the stations every 3.5 minutes, and it will take 37 minutes for the train to travel between Motijheel to Uttara, the two points at both ends of the line.

MRT lines 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 (connecting other areas of the capital) are in planning phase too which will have common inter-connectors to MRT-6. All lines will be competed by 2035.







Some proposed traffic correction underpasses etc.

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## Homo Sapiens



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## Homo Sapiens



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## Bilal9

Recent Dhaka shots courtesy of MirzaZeehan...combination of old and new....






Gulshan Avenue





Banani Rd 11 at Old Airport Rd





Gulshan-2 near Westin





Purana Paltan with Bait-Ul-Mukarram on the left





Tejgaon I/A near upcoming Holiday Inn





Two story Gulshan DIT-2 Market (being demolished) and upcoming 27 story 255 rm Hilton @right





Motijheel (Main Downtown area in Dhaka) Skyline





Shapla Chattar, Dutch Bangla Bank Tower, Zaman Basic Bank Tower (22 stories)

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## Bilal9

Some under-construction renders for commercial properties from Borak Real Estate...

Borak South Park















Borak Mehnur















Borak Acropolis





Borak Zahir Tower





Some upscale condominium properties completed by Unique Properties - their residential subsidiary...

Unique Loft - Residential





Unique Promenade - Residential

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## Banglar Bir

12:00 AM, October 29, 2017 / LAST MODIFIED: 05:35 AM, October 29, 2017
*Get good governance*
*Bangladesh needs strong control structure for planned urbanisation, tell speakers at an int'l conference*




Jatiya Sangsad Speaker Shirin Sharmin Chaudhury speaks at a conference titled “Cities Forum: Building Knowledge Networks and Partnerships for Sustainable Urban Development in Bangladesh” in a Dhaka hotel yesterday. World Bank, Municipality Association of Bangladesh, Institute of Architects Bangladesh, Bangladesh Institute of Planners, and Institution of Engineers, Bangladesh organised the two-day programme beginning on the day. Photo: Star
Staff Correspondent
*Strong governance is the key to planned urbanisation in Bangladesh, said urban experts from home and abroad at an international conference in Dhaka yesterday.*

“The current governance structure is not conducive for Dhaka to become a liveable metro city,” said Balakrishna Menon Parameswaran, lead urban specialist of the World Bank, adding, “Combination of leadership, planning and investment, and meaningful consultation is required for transforming Dhaka into a liveable city.”




*Lack of proper policies or wrong policies or a combination of both was holding back the desired urbanisation in Bangladesh, he said. In an unprecedented event, 20 lakh people moved into Dhaka in the last five years, he said. *

The World Bank, Municipality Association of Bangladesh, Institute of Architects Bangladesh, Bangladesh Institute of Planners, and Institute of Engineers Bangladesh jointly organised the two-day conference on “Cities Forum: Building Knowledge Networks and Partnerships for Sustainable Urban Development in Bangladesh” at the Dhaka Sonargaon Hotel. 

Balakrishna underscored the need for empowering the elected city mayors.

“Strong urban governance is what we need,” said Rene Holenstein, the Swiss ambassador to Bangladesh. 

Qimiao Fan, World Bank country director, said only well-managed urbanisation could lead to sustainable economic growth, allowing productivity and innovations.

*In recent years, Bangladesh has experienced an annual urbanisation growth of 3.3 percent with 5.4 crore people living in the urban centres and the number is predicted to double in the next three decades or so, he said. *

*Urban areas contribute 60 percent of the country's GDP, and Dhaka and Chittagong together share 47 percent of the total output, Fan said.*

This urbanisation is expanding job and manufacturing opportunities, he said, adding that more work was needed to fully capture the enormous benefits of urbanisation.

Bangladesh needs to address the critical challenges brought about by the massive unplanned urbanisation, characterised by high-level poverty, and generally poor housing conditions and liveability.

More than one out of five urban dwellers in Bangladesh lives in poverty, Fan said. 

According to Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics, nearly 62 percent of the urban population, which is about 3 crore people, currently live in informal settlements and slums. 

The country's urban centres need a minimum of $2 billion annual investment for basic infrastructure, such as roads, water and sanitation, to meet the demand of the rapidly growing urban population, Fan said.

In Bangladesh, only three percent of the total public expenditure is on urban infrastructure development, which is very low by global standards. Bhutan spends 16 percent, Nepal 10, Indonesia 34 and South Africa 52 percent, he said. 

*Dhaka South City Corporation Mayor Mohammad Sayeed Khokon said lack of adequate urban planning has led to today's civic woes, traffic congestion and flooding.*

Narayanganj City Corporation Mayor Salina Hayat Ivy said there had always been an effort to keep the local government institutions submissive.

“We as the elected mayors cannot exercise the power provided by the present law and cannot play our mandated roles,” she said.

Different municipalities have different problems and the government needs to address them separately, she said.

Md Akter Mahmud, a professor at the department of urban and regional planning of Jahangirnagar University, pointed out several challenges in urban planning in Bangladesh.

He said Dhaka became the centre of politics, employment, amenities and facilities. “Every year 100,000 people are being added to existing population,” he said, adding that 41 percent of total urban population live in Dhaka.

“Local bodies are not equipped or do not have the technical and financial strength. They also do not have the visionary leadership,” he said suggesting that mayors of municipalities increase income generation capabilities instead of depending on funding from donor agencies and the government.

Akter said every year the country loses one percent of arable land due to unplanned urbanisation.

Robert Cervero, a professor at the department of city and regional planning of the University of California, urged focusing on Dhaka's transportation problems.

He said, “Yes, we need flyovers but there has to be other facilities and strategies to address the city's transportation problems.”

He emphasised the need for introducing mass transportation facilities to curb traffic congestion.

Ralph Becker, former mayor of Salt Lake City, Utah, said galvanising collaboration among all stakeholders with a common goal of public good is what a mayor could facilitate. 

Chief guest Speaker Shirin Sharmin Chaudhury said a comprehensive approach of professional groups and experts was needed to address the complex urbanisation issue.

Md Abdul Baten, president of Municipal Association of Bangladesh, chaired the inaugural session in which 300 mayors, councillors and urban practitioners took part. 

Mel Senen S Sarmiento, who had been the mayor Calbayog city of the Philippines for nine years, also spoke on the occasion.
http://www.thedailystar.net/frontpage/get-good-governance-1483120

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## Banglar Bir

*Time to act on Dhaka city*
Salma Khan 
Update: 17:57, Oct 29, 2017
*It has long been acknowledged that the capital city Dhaka is hardly livable. Any adverse happening in the country has a serious impact on Dhaka. *
According to a survey of the Intelligence Unit of The Economist, Dhaka is the third most unlivable city in the world. 

In context of insecurity for women and also sexual violence against women, Dhaka is in fourth position. Dhaka is also has a high level of physical and mental stress. 
According to a survey of health journal Lancet, Bangladesh tops the list of deaths for environmental cause. 
In different indexes of living standards, Dhaka is steadily deteriorates. 
In this backdrop, Prothom Alo in its editorial had asked, "When will those concerned wake up and act?”

The government hopes to become a middle income country by 2030 through the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). UK-based research centre PWC predicts that this is possible as the GDP growth rate is consistently upward in our country in comparison to other developing countries. So why is the capital of this country in such a bad shape?

Villages were at the heart of development in the nineties. Given the indicators of social development including reduction of poverty, child and mother mortality and population at the village level, Bangladesh became a role model of development. 
*Dhaka became the centre of development. The government and the private sector mostly invested in Dhaka. As a result, people from different districts moved to Dhaka in search of employment, education and health services.*

Although there are district-wise projects under different ministries, they are not properly implemented. As a result, the pressure ultimately falls on the infrastructure and civic amenities of Dhaka. 
*Such extreme pressure leads to unplanned expansion, grabbing, violence, accidents, stealing, robbery, snatching and mismanagement in traffic system. *
All this contributes to serious traffic congestion in Dhaka. 
Women's insecurity is also increasing. 
Dhaka is a mega city due to increased population and high demand for a life standard. It is not surprising that Dhaka is low on the list of livable cities.

The government and the residents of Dhaka have to properly act. It is the responsibility of all to turn our beloved Dhaka into a livable city. The local government, the deputy commissioner, the mayors, and the law enforcing agencies have to play a key role. 

Quality education and employment opportunities for young people have to be created outside Dhaka if the pressure on Dhaka is to reduce. According to UNICEF, 7,100,000 youths aged between 15 and 17 are outside of the education system. In order to create employment for them at a local level, they have to be provided education, especially technical education at a district level. The education ministry and the health ministry have to allocate funds accordingly. 
*
The huge number of vehicles is not the main cause of traffic congestion in Dhaka. It is violation of the traffic rules that mainly causes traffic congestion. *The traffic rules should be enforced strictly. Due to violation of traffic rules, Bangladesh is on top of the list when it comes to road accidents. 

In mega cities like Singapore and Jakarta, vehicles are controlled strictly. In Jakarta, every car has to have at least three passengers or they have to buy tokens. 
In Singapore, cars with even numbered licence plates move one day and odd number cars on the alternate days. Otherwise, they have to pay extra.

Emphasis has to be given on education, health and employment to turn Dhaka into a livable city. Education and health services have to be expanded. 
Employment opportunities have to be decentralised. 
*In the eighties of last century, the government declared that some special ministries and departments would be shifted outside Dhaka. 
These were the shipping ministry, the railway ministry, and the labour and employment ministry. 
Still such steps can be taken so that development takes place in other areas of the country and young entrepreneurship is created. *

Dhaka will have to be turned into an able mega city to provide all sorts of social, economic and civic amenities as we achieved independent Bangladesh at the sacrifice of three million people. Dhaka will be number one on the list of livable cities. For this, all concerned have to act now.

Salma Khan is an economist and women’s leader.
*This piece, originally published in Prothom Alo print edition, has been rewritten in English by Rabiul Islam.
http://en.prothom-alo.com/opinion/news/164737/Time-to-act-on-Dhaka-city

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## Banglar Bir

*Bangladesh’s urban underbelly a cause for concern*
Abu Siddique
Published at 05:22 PM October 30, 2017
Last updated at 12:52 AM October 31, 2017




Garbage floats on the Rayerbazar canal just outside the Rayerbazar slum in Dhaka
*Mahmud Hossain Opu/Dhaka Tribune*
*About 2.2 million people live in the nation's urban slums as squatters and floating population. This is the first of a three-part series in which the Dhaka Tribune's Abu Siddique explores the rights of slum dwellers, their access to the safety net and basic civic services such as healthcare and sanitation*
With a population of 160 million, Bangladesh is gradually moving towards middle-income status with many people’s fortunes rising because of trade and industrial activity in cities like Dhaka and Chittagong.

However, the growth of such urban centres has come at a cost, with urban sprawl and rapid rural-to-urban migration putting a strain on infrastructure and services.

“We are gradually doing a lot of things to improve the conditions in the slums but because the number of people keeps rising every day, it is hard for us to keep up,” Slum Development Officer of Dhaka South City Corporation, A K M Lutfur Rahman, said.

The annual population growth rate recorded in the 2014 Census of Slum Areas and Floating Population was 2.70%. This has created a housing issue where most of the urban poor have ended up living in slums that are not equipped with basic facilities such as safe drinking water, sanitation and healthcare.

“The absence of a coordinating mechanism between the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and the Ministry of Local Government is increasing the problem,” said Prof Nazrul Islam, a leading slum specialist.
*
The 2014 census recorded a rise in the number of slums in Bangladesh from just 2,991 in 1997 to 13,935 slums in 2014*. 
These were home to 2,232,114 people, or 6.33% of the urban population of the country.

The census found that 52.5% of households in Bangladesh sourced their drinking water from tube wells, while 45.2% of households had tap water.

In city corporation areas of Dhaka, 55.1% of slum dwellers got their drinking water from taps and 42.5% got their drinking water from tube wells.

In stark contrast, 87.6% of slum dwellers in municipal areas got their drinking water from tube wells whereas only 10.3% of households had taps. About 5.7% of slum dwellers sourced their water from ponds or ditches.

“It is very unfortunate that there are still a lot of people who are living without fresh drinking water,” Khairul Islam, country director of WaterAid Bangladesh, said.




_House inside the Rayerbazar slum in Dhaka – *Mahmud Hossain Opu/Dhaka Tribune*_
*According to the Urban Health Survey 2013, 32.7% of slums under both the city corporation did not have any government facilities available, while 36.9% of the slums were bereft of community health workers.*

Additionally, the Demographic Health Survey 2014 found that the urban poor had little access to healthcare in the slums, where the prevalence of family planning and institutional delivery was 54% and 45.5% respectively.

Of the many health indicators, Bangladesh has significantly reduced the child death rate through measures including a countrywide immunisation programme among children.

Slum children also received the polio vaccine during a national programme introduced by the government. However, the percentage of slum children who received polio vaccine was about 94.9%, compared to universal coverage nationwide.

Brig Gen Md Zakir Hassan, chief health officer of Dhaka North City Corporation, said ignorance is the reason why slum dwellers do not pay much heed to their health workers.

“It often seems as though healthcare officials had to motivate parents to immunise their children or get a checkup when they had a cold,” he said.

The prevalence of latrine facilities is treated as a substantive indicator of a healthy and hygienic environment. Data from the 2014 slum census showed that 42.2% of households used a pit for a latrine, followed by 26.2% using sanitary latrines.

Tin latrines were used by 21.1%, hanging/kutcha by 8.6%, and open spaces by 1.8% on a national level.

In city corporation areas, 42.5% of households used pit latrines, followed by 26% using sanitary (water sealed) latrines. Tin latrines were used by 23.6% of households, hanging/kutcha by 6.8%, and open spaces by 1.8% of households.

In municipal areas, 41.8% of slum dwellers used pit latrines and 28.9% used sanitary latrines, while 14.8% used hanging/kutcha latrines, 10.4% tin latrines, and 4.2% open spaces.

According to the 2014 slum census, the total number of household enumerated was 594,861, of which 431,756 were in the city corporation areas, 130,145 were in municipal areas and 32,960 were in other urban areas. The average household size is 3.75.
http://www.dhakatribune.com/bangladesh/2017/10/30/bangladeshs-urban-underbelly-cause-concern/

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## Banglar Bir

*Urban poor often overlooked for social safety net programme*
Abu Siddique
Published at 02:30 AM November 01, 2017
Last updated at 02:33 AM November 01, 2017




File Photo
*Of the Old Age Allowance, 94.03% covers the rural poor while only 5.97% goes to the urban poor*
Massive imbalances exist in the level of support given to the urban poor and the rural poor under the social safety net programmes (SSNPs) initiated by the government, research by Concern Worldwide Bangladesh has found.

The study showed that among the two major SSNPs – the Old Age Allowance and Widowed and Distressed Women Allowance – there is a vast discrepancy in the distribution of support between the urban poor and the rural poor.

Of the Old Age Allowance, 94.03% covers the rural poor while only 5.97% goes to the urban poor. The Widowed and Distressed Women Allowance is even more lopsided, loaded 98.32% in favour of the rural poor and only 1.68% to the urban poor.

Gazi Mohammad Nurul Kabir, director general of Department of Social services, said the programmes are part designed to reduce the migration of lower income groups to urban areas.

“One of the major intentions of the SSNPs is to provide more support to rural areas (and) that is why the government has been running different programmes as an incentive to have them return to the villages,” he said.

However, the National Social Security Strategy 2015 acknowledges the shortcomings of the safety net programmes and aims to reform the provisions to ensure “more efficient and effective use of resources, strengthened delivery systems and progress towards a more inclusive form of Social Security”.




To give the urban poor as equal access as their rural counterparts, the strategy plans to provide services for the elderly, children, vulnerable women and people with disabilities.

Amela Begum, 50, is originally from Jamalpur but lives in a shanty near Khilgaon flyover and earns Tk2,000 a month working as a maid. Despite living in Dhaka for almost 20 years, she has no idea about the SSNPs that she can access when sick or as a vulnerable woman.

Quazi Shahbuddin, an economist and the former director general of Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies (BIDS), told the Dhaka Tribune: “The reason why people still keep migrating to urban areas might have something to do with finding better employment opportunities. As the government’s resources are limited, it has to choose where the support goes first.”
*No permanent address? No NID*
There are more than 594,861 people living in slums or are homeless according to the Census of Slum Areas and Floating Population 2014, who by the nature of their living situation are unable to get a National Identity Card (NID) or a birth certificate even though these documents have been made mandatory by the government.

The problem is that Dhaka is home to a large number of migrant workers who usually work in the informal sector and move from one job to another very frequently. Their addresses change along with their jobs.
*
Ultimately, the children of these people are unable to enroll in school as they do have a birth certificate, which also needs a permanent address.*




Razia Sultana and her family has been living in Dhaka for 20 years usually in shanties or on the footpaths. She now lives in a shanti in Maniknagar area and because of this, she cannot acquire a NID or get birth certificates for her children.

“For last three years, my husband and I along with our three children have been living here. I tried to enroll my youngest child, Alamin in school but they refused to take him because he does not have a birth certificate,” she told the Dhaka Tribune.

Because she works from down to dusk, she said they had no idea how to even get a NID.

Director of (operations) of National Identity Registration Wing, Abdul Baten said, according to the law, a permanent address is mandatory when applying for a NID. *“We cannot help people without a permanent address.”*
http://www.dhakatribune.com/banglad...often-overlooked-social-safety-net-programme/

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## Banglar Bir

12:00 AM, October 30, 2017 / LAST MODIFIED: 01:25 PM, October 30, 2017
*WORLD CITIES DAY*
*The death and life of great global cities*




Illustration: Ehsanur Raza Ronny
Adnan Morshed
As his airplane approached the sprawling international airport in Mymensingh, the capital of the South Asian country of Bangladesh, Kareem Sebastian surveyed the deltaic Bengal geography below and wondered about what was going on during the final years of the country's lost megapolis Dhaka. Located to the south of the current capital, this once-upon-a-time-city occupied more or less the epicentre of an intricate riverine system. It was a sunny October morning with great visibility, allowing him a clear view of a vast urban ruin. *The year was 2044.

Was there a Pompeii moment for Dhaka or was it a slow disintegration?* An urban anthropologist and a professor at Harvard, Kareem Sebastian was commissioned by the _New York Global_ newspaper to retrace the triumphant and tragic histories of two South Asian cities: Mohenjo-daro and Dhaka.

The goal was to shed some new light on why and how cities rise and fall. The occasion for Sebastian's assignment was the World Cities Day, established over three decades ago on October 27, 2013, by the United Nations General Assembly, with the mission of raising international community's awareness of cities as an effective platform for good governance, social inclusion and interaction, environmental stewardship, and sustainable economic development. 

"Well, listening to you I can visualise the urban politics of Dhaka during its final years. As one would imagine, a city thrives when it treats all its citizens fairly. It is not just the individual's material prosperity, but the social advancement of the larger community that the city needs.

Since 2013, the United Nations has designated October 31 as the World Cities Day. Each year, the day is celebrated on the basis of a given theme. For example, the theme for 2016 was “Inclusive Cities, Shared Development” and, for 2017, it was “Innovative Governance, Open Cities.”

The impetus for establishing the World Cities Day is understandable. The year 2007 witnessed a major demographic milestone in human history. That year the earth's urban population crossed the 50 percent threshold and the “Urban Millennium” in human history began. 

The end of the last millennium was marked by a rapidly urbanising world and a corresponding surge in global urban population, which rose from 13 percent (220 million) in 1900 to 29 percent (732 million) in 1950 to 51.3 percent (3.5 billion) in 2010. According to some estimates, 75 percent of humanity, that is over 6 billion people, will be living in cities and towns by 2050. 

Designating a World Cities Day in 2013 not only made sense, but was also necessary. While cities could be a great economic boon and provide greater access to opportunities, cities—if not planned and managed with effective environmental policies and a sense of social justice—could also be a devastating threat to human existence. The historic relationship between the concept of _civitas _(a popular Latin term during the Roman Empire, denoting a social body of citizens) and the resilience of the city needed to be reimagined at the beginning of the Urban Millennium.

Sebastian understood his South Asian assignment in the political context of the emerging Urban Millennium. His mission was to compare and contrast the rise and fall of two cities: one on the bank of the Indus River, well known for its spectacular development as one of the first cities in human history over four millennia ago, and the other on the bank of Buriganga River, known during its heyday as the densest city in the world. Even though the two cities represent two radically different historic eras, they are linked by the common theme of water management as the very basis of their existence. Sebastian was asked by the editors of the _New York Global_ to reflect on the promises and perils of 21st-century urbanisation by learning the lessons of history.

His experience in Mohenjo-daro, the 4500-year-old Indus Valley city located on high grounds in the modern-day Larkana district of Sindh province in Pakistan, was intriguing. Not known to modern archaeologists until the 1920s, the city profited from the fertile lands of the Indus River floodplain and the hydraulic knowledge of the mysterious Indus Valley people. In an ancient form of “globalisation,” the people of Mohenjo-daro traded with the civilisations of Mesopotamia, going north-west by both land and sea routes.




View of Mohenjo-daro's Great Bath, showing the surrounding urban layout.
As he walked inside the archaeological sites of Mohenjo-daro, Sebastian grasped the urban nature of the city. He had studied its glorious history, dramatised by a Bollywood film in 2016. During its peak from about 2500 to 1900 BCE, Mohenjo-daro, spreading out over 250 acres on elevated grounds, was one of the largest and most prosperous among the cities of early civilisations in Egypt, Mesopotamia, and China. It was not a city of kings, queens or high priests, as no trace of any major citadel, palace or temple has been found. 

As Sebastian strolled around the city's central focus, the Great Bath, a massive community pool, Mohenjo-daro's forte in urban water management became clear to him. The city's hydraulic engineering—from over 700 cylindrical wells serving water to urban households to elaborate water delivery and sewage systems by means of brick pipes—was the most advanced at the time.

The city's planners and engineers were experts at harnessing the river water not only for irrigation agriculture, but also for everyday use by means of an elaborate distribution system built under brick platforms and orthogonal urban streets. The hydraulic management system suggested that the city's administrators were more intent on serving the city people on an egalitarian basis rather than creating monumental, politically convenient architecture to glorify a ruling elite.

Why Mohenjo-daro perished sometime around 1800 BCE remains a mystery. No one knows for sure. While he learned a lot from his visit, Sebastian left Pakistan with an array of unanswered or unanswerable questions. And, that is the mystery of the city. 

Three days after he arrived in Mymensingh, Sebastian took a road trip to the ruins of Dhaka. Guided by a local urban planner and historian named Rimon Haider, he first went to Old Dhaka, most of which now rots under Buriganga's contaminated water.

He asked his guide, “What happened?” 

Haider sighed, “*Well, despite the then Prime Minister's sincere directives, the political and business mafia kept on encroaching on the Buriganga River to build their factories, warehouses, residential complexes, and markets.* 
Narrowed each year, the river could carry less and less water. This happened to other rivers surrounding Dhaka and beyond. The Bengal delta's natural and necessary water drainage system was drastically reduced. Rivers started dying but the monsoon water kept rushing down from the Himalayan plateau. Then there was another problem. Despite a national ban on dumping untreated industrial effluent into the river, the industrialists and their cohorts hardly felt any ethical qualms about treating the rivers as drains. The city's destruction was a matter of time.”
*
"Weren't there any environmental laws?"*
"There were, but most people didn't care about laws or the environment. People broke the law with impunity. There was this corrosive culture of illegal wealth accumulation at any cost. The environment suffered irreparably."
*
"What about architects and planners? What were they doing?"*
"Well, their feeble environmental activism was often sentimental, sporadic, and not research-based. Their half-hearted activism was not enough to save the city and its environment. Besides, architects knowingly and unknowingly played along the dominant official development narrative that took precedence over the natural environment. I suspect that their professional education did not prepare them adequately to be self-critical citizens. There was a glaring hole in pedagogy."
*
"Who framed the country's mainstream development narrative? Where were such global actors as the World Bank in this narrative?"*
"Well, the big guys of the World Bank often flew in and saw the city mostly as a huge market. How would urbanisation increase economic productivity? 
The World Bank's 2017 Dhaka East vision was the epitome of anti-environment, neoliberal urban policies that have largely been rejected in the developed world. The Bank wouldn't dare present such ideas to cities like London, Paris, New York or Vienna. Why were they experimenting with pro-market, pro-elite urban policies in developing countries? Because they could, without much local intellectual, research-based resistance. While New York City was increasingly pedestrianising city streets to recreate a people-centric city and Copenhagen was envisioning a city core completely devoid of cars, the World Bank gurus were lamenting the loss of vehicular speed in Dhaka. Their planning vision revolved around mega infrastructure projects, blatantly denying the interests of the majority of urban dwellers."

*"My research tells me that Dhaka's traffic congestion was so notorious that the city's annual loss due to traffic jam was nearly USD 4 billion! Was the World Bank wrong to promote infrastructures like flyovers?"*

"The World Bank mostly sold an elitist vision of the city, one in which pro-market social mobility was the key mantra. That vision hardly benefited the 85 percent of daily commuters, who used rickety, congested public transportation or walked to work. Instead of focusing on reducing the public demand for cars, they wanted to make the car supply chain more efficient. In other words, there was a rising middle class and make personal automobiles affordable for them and provide them with more four-lane highways, flyovers, and gated communities along the river."




Aerial view of Dhaka in 2017. Photo: Adnan Morshed
*"So, what did it all mean?"*
"Buy more cars and consume more gas and be proud members of an uber-consumerist society. It was a mercantile vision that was also hyped up by the country's bureaucratic regime. Why didn't the World Bank invest in a robust footpath plan across the country and bike-sharing programmes? Alas, these zero-carbon developments were not market-friendly. They make urban dwellers healthier but don't necessarily advance market interests."

As they trekked the ruinous streets of this ghost city in their Jeep, Sebastian and Haider reached where Dhaka's Karail slum used to be. They paused for some time to visualise what was going on in this part of the city.
*
Sebastian asked, “How did the ruling class frame the development narrative?”*
Haider was on target. “The ruling elite was interested in the city's symbol-centric and GDP-centric development. 
*Development was viewed exclusively as a challenge of economic growth. 
The ideas of social justice and equality were often left out of the development discourse. *
The economic growth didn't trickle down to the bottom of the food chain, inevitably spawning crime-prone and malnourished low-income communities. 
There was a lot of buzz about slum improvement, but the poor was seen as sub-human and dispensable Other. 
*An all-out civil war between haves and have-nots became ominously real.”*

"Yes, in _An Uncertain Glory: India and Its Contradictions_—published in the same year that the World Cities Day was established—the economists Jean Dreze and Amartya Sen talked about how a country couldn't expect to move forward simply riding on a glitzy consumerist economy, while the lowest rungs of society didn't have access to quality healthcare, education, and other basic needs. A good city must offer a sense of social justice not only through its public and private institutions, but also through its spatial and urban organisation. 

One can't ghettoise the poor with very few opportunities available to them and expect to become a liveable, humane city. Aesthetic gymnastics alone won't do it. A few very modern-looking buildings and wavy concrete bridges over lakes don't make a city great. Was this the feeling one would get on the streets of Dhaka then?"

"You could argue that. Dhaka was frequently decorated with flyovers, expensive roadside beautification projects including bonsai galleries, and water fountains, while ordinary city people struggled hard to eke out a minimal existence. 
*There was a lot of anger on the street. 
There was no basic sense of fairness in society. 
Anarchy and debauchery ate away the soul of the society."*

"Well, listening to you I can visualise the urban politics of Dhaka during its final years. As one would imagine, a city thrives when it treats all its citizens fairly. It is not just the individual's material prosperity, but the social advancement of the larger community that the city needs. Greek thinkers called it the health of the Koinonia, or community. 
*
A city becomes liveable when all its citizens share a common vision of peaceful coexistence. 
This vision slowly but steadily transforms into a social contract that all citizens learn to abide by. 
Over two millennia ago Aristotle compared the city, the polis, with a ship and the duty of all city people was to assure 'the preservation of the ship in its voyage.'"*

"Yes, I was trying to bring up the issue of fairness in our conversation. 
Consider Purbachal, a 6000-acre-plus floodplain on the eastern frontier of Dhaka, transformed into a mammoth real-estate development that only the rich could afford. 

Many members of the wealthy class brought investment properties there, meaning that the plot they purchased would not be used for their primary homes. Not only did Purbachal not meet the city's vast housing needs, but it also contributed to the city's paralysing waterlogging problems. Because its fancy single-family plots sat squarely on an intricate network of natural drains. Even moderate rain began to flood city streets. Water-borne diseases began to spread. Real-estate developments like Purbachal mushroomed all across the city, causing irredeemable damage to the hydro-geography of the city."
*
"So, what was the general mood like in the city then?"*
"Well, Dhaka was a primate city, meaning that it was disproportionately larger than other cities in the country. 
*Impoverished people from rural hinterlands kept on flocking to the capital in search of better lives. *
There was a lot of buzz about decentralisation among the policymakers, but Dhaka kept on growing in all directions, shouldering an unsustainable national burden. 
Its national GDP share was nearly 40 percent around 2015. 
By 2030, Dhaka had nearly 40 million people within its metropolitan area, the densest concentration of humanity on the face of the earth. The impossible equation of a lot of needy people and limited resources gave rise to a stressed-out, burnt-out society."
*"A collective neurosis of society?"*
"Yes, a study undertaken by Zipjet sometime around 2017 revealed that most Asian cities were stressful places to live in. 
The study ranked cities' stress level based on 'air pollution, gender equality, unemployment, mental health and even the amount of sun that a city gets.' *In that study, Dhaka ranked the seventh most stressed city in the world. *
With a global ranking of 144, Dhaka's social stress level was skyrocketing. 
Densely populated and having the worst traffic congestion in the world, the city's mental and physical health was on the verge of collapse. 
Yes, there were a few pockets of magic in the city—Louis Kahn's parliament complex, wooded areas on the Dhaka University campus, many cool eateries here and there, some art galleries and museums, and a burgeoning café culture. 
But the city's infernal, unmanaged growth, combined with the city administration's inability to understand what a city is and should be, as well as the city people's general apathy toward their city, led to a point of no return."
*"So, what happened to Dhaka at the end?"*
"Well, no one knows for sure. 
*Was it like Mohenjo-daro? *
I don't know. Historians offered a host of possible reasons for the demise of the Indus Valley civilisation. Such as: the Indus River drastically changed its course; Aryans invaded the Indus region and destroyed the settlements; dissatisfaction brought on by a change of climate; the exhaustion of timber resources in the mass production of baked bricks; the salting of arable soil by floods and irrigation; and the Indus Valley population civilisation reached its uttermost economic limit."
*"So, do you think Dhaka will rise again one day?"
May be.*
Sebastian and Haider called it a day and prepared to return to Mymensingh.
_Adnan Morshed, PhD, is an architect, architectural historian, and urbanist, and currently serving as Chairperson of the Department of Architecture at BRAC University. He is the author of Impossible Heights: Skyscrapers, Flight, and the Master Builder (2015) and Oculus: A Decade of Insights in Bangladeshi Affairs (2012). He can be reached at amorshed@bracu.ac.bd. _
http://www.thedailystar.net/in-focus/the-death-and-life-great-global-cities-1483486


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## Banglar Bir

2:00 AM, November 11, 2017 / LAST MODIFIED: 12:30 PM, November 11, 2017
*EDITORIAL*
*Most of city's human waste untreated*
*Water bodies, public health at grave risk*





Photo: Prabir Das
*We are shocked to know from a report in this paper that 80 percent of Dhaka city's human waste goes directly into its water bodies, leaving the water contaminated and untreatable. This poses a huge risk to public health (outbreak of serious waterborne diseases) and the environment. What is appalling is why a crucial apparatus as sewage management has not been upgraded to meet the demands of a city growing at such an exponential rate. Dhaka now has around 1.75 crore people and the sewerage authority, Wasa, can treat only 20 percent of the city area. 
Can this be an acceptable rate of sewage treatment that leaves unmanaged the remaining 80 percent of waste? *
The growth in the city's population and unplanned construction of buildings are an ongoing process so it is hardly news that the original sewage system will not be able to manage the huge increase in solid waste. The recent official letter from a ministry to the LGRD and cooperatives minister says that rivers are being contaminated by septic tanks illegally connected to storm drains and the minister has duly called upon Rajuk (Rajdhani Unnayan Kartripakkha) to ensure that there are proper septic tanks at every house and prevent such connections while issuing building permits. 

Why do such instructions need to be given now for what should have been a routine task for Rajuk—to enforce the 1984 building rule that requires every owner to set up septic tanks or soak pits and manage the sewage on their own? Rajuk can fine a violator a minimum of Tk 50,000 and even cancel the building's approval. Yet the law has been shamelessly flouted for decades.

Wasa, Rajuk and the city corporations must immediately start coordinating with each other to make sure that each house has a septic tank or soak pit. Localised treatment plants for cluster neighbourhoods can also be set up to manage the waste. Without immediate steps to enforce building rules and introduce practical, innovative methods of waste management, the city will face a huge public health and environmental disaster.
http://www.thedailystar.net/editorial/most-citys-human-waste-untreated-1489462


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## chatterjee

Banglar abal eshe thread tar gua mere dilo

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## Bilal9

chatterjee said:


> Banglar abal eshe thread tar gua mere dilo





You have to highlight the negative issues with positive. He's not saying anything we don't know. 

If you can't do that - then we will become another delusional country (like the one West of us).

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## Nilgiri

Bilal9 said:


> delusional country



Quite rich coming from you mr fail:

https://defence.pk/pdf/threads/human-capital-report-2017-bd-did-great.517722/

"*In fact India ranks below Bangladesh in Human Capital Index and will continue to do so because of its size and the terrible education and health conditions"---mr fail from one of absolute lowest earning communities in the US
*
------ and boom just 1 year later karma served cold....like the time frame from tanks rolling into Dhaka after his jamaati elders traitorously chest thumped in 1970.


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## Homo Sapiens

chatterjee said:


> Banglar abal eshe thread tar gua mere dilo


He single handedly hijacked the Bangladesh defence section.He has little mental ability to distinguish between fake, conspiracy and propaganda news and genuine and important news.Like many other threads, he also turned this thread into abyss.Thread title was 'urban development in Bangladesh' but he turned it into 'slum poverty in Bangladesh'. He doesn't care if this section lost it's relevance and turn into a joke with so many meaningless, and irrelevant thread.

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## Banglar Bir

*City planners’ confce ends with 7-point declaration*
Staff Correspondent | Published: 00:53, Nov 12,2017 




Guests are seen at the closing ceremony of UTC Dhaka-2017 organised by Institute of Architects Bangladesh and International Union of Architects in the capital’s Agargaon on Saturday. — New Age photo
*A three-day conference of architects and city planners ended in Dhaka on Saturday with a seven-point declaration emphasising district-wise budgets, universal access to infrastructures and services, and sustainable city plan with focus on local context instead of any fixed definition.* 
World Urban Campaign, an advocacy and partnership platform to raise awareness about urbanisation, and its partners — Institute of Architects Bangladesh (IAB) and International Union of Architects (IUA), organised the conference titled ‘innovation, identity and designing of intermediate cities for the city we need.’

IUA’s representative to UN Habitat Ishtiaque Zahir Titas read out the declaration at the closing ceremony of the Urban Thinkers Campus Dhaka 2017 at the IAB Centre in the capital’s Agargaon.
The declaration includes forming of a local government commission led by elected public representatives to promote good governance and transparency. 
It also suggests organisational reformation, decentralisation and opening one stop service centres.
*
The declaration comes up with schemes to redefine intermediate cities in terms of local climate, identity, perspectives, objectives, connectivity, power, social and cultural context and capacity rather than international definition.* 

Housing and public works minister Mosharraf Hossain welcomed the initiative and said there were many problems in the implementation process of any development plan in the country.
*He pointed out that sewerage and waste management system were two main problems in cities, including Dhaka and Chittagong.*

IAB president Kazi Golam Nasir said their aim was to bring all stakeholders under same platform for a compact suggestion for the policy makers and implementing agencies.

IAB vice-president (international relations) Ehsan Khan said their initiative was a part of enhancing sustainable development goals (SDG) set by the UN.

IAB former president Mubasshar Hussain said they tried to find out the solution for building a people-friendly city. 

He said architects and planners could made suitable design but implementation depends on the politicians. 

He urged the leaders for adapting the suggestions for a better development of the country.
IAB vice-president (national) Jalal Ahmed presented the summery of the sessions held in the three days.
http://www.newagebd.net/article/28195/city-planners-confce-ends-with-7-point-declaration

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## Mage

Banglar Bir said:


> 2:00 AM, November 11, 2017 / LAST MODIFIED: 12:30 PM, November 11, 2017
> *EDITORIAL*
> *Most of city's human waste untreated*
> *Water bodies, public health at grave risk*
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Photo: Prabir Das
> *We are shocked to know from a report in this paper that 80 percent of Dhaka city's human waste goes directly into its water bodies, leaving the water contaminated and untreatable. This poses a huge risk to public health (outbreak of serious waterborne diseases) and the environment. What is appalling is why a crucial apparatus as sewage management has not been upgraded to meet the demands of a city growing at such an exponential rate. Dhaka now has around 1.75 crore people and the sewerage authority, Wasa, can treat only 20 percent of the city area.
> Can this be an acceptable rate of sewage treatment that leaves unmanaged the remaining 80 percent of waste? *
> The growth in the city's population and unplanned construction of buildings are an ongoing process so it is hardly news that the original sewage system will not be able to manage the huge increase in solid waste. The recent official letter from a ministry to the LGRD and cooperatives minister says that rivers are being contaminated by septic tanks illegally connected to storm drains and the minister has duly called upon Rajuk (Rajdhani Unnayan Kartripakkha) to ensure that there are proper septic tanks at every house and prevent such connections while issuing building permits.
> 
> Why do such instructions need to be given now for what should have been a routine task for Rajuk—to enforce the 1984 building rule that requires every owner to set up septic tanks or soak pits and manage the sewage on their own? Rajuk can fine a violator a minimum of Tk 50,000 and even cancel the building's approval. Yet the law has been shamelessly flouted for decades.
> 
> Wasa, Rajuk and the city corporations must immediately start coordinating with each other to make sure that each house has a septic tank or soak pit. Localised treatment plants for cluster neighbourhoods can also be set up to manage the waste. Without immediate steps to enforce building rules and introduce practical, innovative methods of waste management, the city will face a huge public health and environmental disaster.
> http://www.thedailystar.net/editorial/most-citys-human-waste-untreated-1489462


I guess you have read other's reaction on your posts here. Can you create a different thread and move your posts elsewhere?

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## chatterjee

Bilal9 said:


> You have to highlight the negative issues with positive. He's not saying anything we don't know.
> 
> If you can't do that - then we will become another delusional country (like the one West of us).


Brother look at the thread name urban *DEVELOPMENT *in Bangladesh and what he is posting!!!

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## Bilal9

chatterjee said:


> Brother look at the thread name urban *DEVELOPMENT *in Bangladesh and what he is posting!!!



Well if you feel that he's not posting __what_ _he __should_ _post then you should __respectfully__ ask him to post more on-topic posts. The key word is respect. As I realize he is an older brother.

I am always glad to act when people point out the error of my ways, __if_ _they do it nicely and respectfully.

This is my key philosophy (yes even for people that I do not like, my various PDF detractors).

I admit that I really regretted the times I've flown off the handle and hurt people's feelings here (when I was stressed with work-pressures and having a bad day). Those are my negative ratings - and they are with me for good.

Now - more on topic, "urban development" means different things to different people. In the strictest sense of the word - it may mean, either,

1. Modern Urban Structures going up to enhance the skylines in Bangladesh (and the study of urban architecture in our country).​Or,
2. Taking care of the 'ills of Bangladesh urbanization', such as pressures and problems with,

a) housing (slums),
b) transportation (road and public transport issues )
c) utilities (electricty, water issues)
d) zoning (illegal footpath and bazaar encroachment, businesses in residential areas)​
Now collectively, if you all feel that we'd rather discuss Number 1 here instead or Number 2 (and has historically turned out that way), then we should all decide to discourage posts of the latter type. And agree on it.

But it should be a consensus. A democratic one.

And one agreed on by a foundation of respect for all members within PDF.

I will ask the MODs to see what they have to say as well, per our rules here.

@Oscar, @waz @WAJsal Bhais your opinions please.

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## EasyNow

Bro you're being too kind. It's true that "urban development" has many meanings, but you set the precedent for this thread a long time ago - it is about recognizing new projects and the general development of Bangladesh in a positive light.

Our dear 'india doctrine' quoter (wonder who that could be) is on a malicious campaign against his own country just to prove himself right - and he is ruining the thread.



Bilal9 said:


> Well if you feel that he's not posting __what_ _he __should_ _post then you should __respectfully__ ask him to post more on-topic posts. The key word is respect. As I realize he is an older brother.
> 
> I am always glad to act when people point out the error of my ways, __if_ _they do it nicely and respectfully.
> 
> This is my key philosophy (yes even for people that I do not like, my various PDF detractors).
> 
> I admit that I really regretted the times I've flown off the handle and hurt people's feelings here (when I was stressed with work-pressures and having a bad day). Those are my negative ratings - and they are with me for good.
> 
> Now - more on topic, "urban development" means different things to different people. In the strictest sense of the word - it may mean, either,
> 
> 1. Modern Urban Structures going up to enhance the skylines in Bangladesh (and the study of urban architecture in our country).​Or,
> 2. Taking care of the 'ills of Bangladesh urbanization', such as pressures and problems with,
> 
> a) housing (slums),
> b) transportation (road and public transport issues )
> c) utilities (electricty, water issues)
> d) zoning (illegal footpath and bazaar encroachment, businesses in residential areas)​
> Now collectively, if you all feel that we'd rather discuss Number 1 here instead or Number 2 (and has historically turned out that way), then we should all decide to discourage posts of the latter type. And agree on it.
> 
> But it should be a consensus. A democratic one.
> 
> And one agreed on by a foundation of respect for all members within PDF.
> 
> I will ask the MODs to see what they have to say as well, per our rules here.
> 
> @Oscar, @waz @WAJsal Bhais your opinions please.

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## Banglar Bir

PersonasNonGrata said:


> Bro you're being too kind. It's true that "urban development" has many meanings, but you set the precedent for this thread a long time ago - it is about recognizing new projects and the general development of Bangladesh in a positive light.
> Our dear 'india doctrine' quoter (wonder who that could be) is on a malicious campaign against his own country just to prove himself right - and he is ruining the thread.


*Every coin has two sides,* development of our Mega city,is indeed a commendable feat.
However, as a resident of Dhaka for since 1958,I witnessed the City being developed in an unplanned haphazard manner lacking Strategic vision,where is* DAP*? *Along with all other recommendations of the respective expert committee submitted to the successive governments,why are these not being implemented alongside as well?*

The answer is crystal clear to the conscious City dwellers,i.e.* Corruption*,being the sole motive.Absence of Accountability,Transparency,Good Governance,etc.This is a clear indication of a single person being the Judge, the Jury and the Executioner. Prime example of an autocratic or Oligarchic state. 

Sharing and eating a piece of the *Pie,or sheer looting* by the Developers along with all concerned Government agencies,corruption at its highest,while we the victims or City dwellers,need to install expensive reverse Osmosis devices in residences just to drink a glass of tap water,laced with sewer filth, worms,etc.

Wade through overflowing sewerage filth roads and pavements illegally rented out to various vendors,by the local Political syndicates in conjunction with the police.ete,etc.
During Monsoons the scenario is beyond comprehension, a nightmare to be honest.

Sitting thousands of miles away and enjoying a cozy Western life,kindy don't shed crocodile tears and try to highlight your BAL Era/Age of Golden Development.

Let us the taxpayers,and the worst sufferers vent out the existing ground reality and pressurise the government to urgently implement the projects those needs immediate implementation.

Anyways many thanks for your kind concern and true show of Patriotism.


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## EasyNow

Banglar Bir said:


> *Every coin has two sides,* development of our Mega city,is indeed a commendable feat.
> However, as a resident of Dhaka for since 1958,I witnessed the City being developed in an unplanned haphazard manner lacking Strategic vision,where is* DAP*? *Along with all other recommendations of the respective expert committee submitted to the successive governments,why are these not being implemented alongside as well?*
> 
> The answer is crystal clear to the conscious City dwellers,i.e.* Corruption*,being the sole motive.Absence of Accountability,Transparency,Good Governance,etc.This is a clear indication of a single person being the Judge, the Jury and the Executioner. Prime example of an autocratic or Oligarchic state.
> 
> Sharing and eating a piece of the *Pie,or sheer looting* by the Developers along with all concerned Government agencies,corruption at its highest,while we the victims or City dwellers,need to install expensive reverse Osmosis devices in residences just to drink a glass of tap water,laced with sewer filth, worms,etc.
> 
> Wade through overflowing sewerage filth roads and pavements illegally rented out to various vendors,by the local Political syndicates in conjunction with the police.ete,etc.
> During Monsoons the scenario is beyond comprehension, a nightmare to be honest.
> 
> Sitting thousands of miles away and enjoying a cozy Western life,kindy don't shed crocodile tears and try to highlight your BAL Era/Age of Golden Development.
> 
> Let us the taxpayers,and the worst sufferers vent out the existing ground reality and pressurise the government to urgently implement the projects those needs immediate implementation.
> 
> Anyways many thanks for your kind concern and true show of Patriotism.



The other side of the coin is plenty reflected in the dozens of threads you have opened, it does not need to be rammed in here too.

I don't think anyone in the world thinks Bangladesh is problem-free, this thread was attempting to focus on the small positives in our land but you will not allow that either.

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## Bilal9

PersonasNonGrata said:


> Bro you're being too kind. It's true that "urban development" has many meanings, but you set the precedent for this thread a long time ago - it is about recognizing new projects and the general development of Bangladesh in a positive light.
> 
> Our dear 'india doctrine' quoter (wonder who that could be) is on a malicious campaign against his own country just to prove himself right - and he is ruining the thread.



If we have disagreements among posters - they should be solved amicably and through discussion. I am not personally into pointing fingers, which doesn't solve anything.

We are all adults - I'm sure @Banglar Bir bhai will heed our suggestion about posting only specific things in specific threads. Right brother?

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## Banglar Bir

*@Bilal9*
*SENIOR MEMBER*
*Salam brother, out of my sheer respect towards a reputable/knowledgeable distinguished member like you and as a reflection of good faith, from now onwards I am willing to refrain posting the reverse side of the coin in a thread created by you.While, I am also earnestly requesting to highlight the plight faced by us the City dwellers,irrespective of their social classification. 
My humble request to all reputed PDF members, would be NOT to use this enlightened forum as a propaganda tool/Goebbels deceitful lies, by the RAWami goons. *

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## Bilal9

Banglar Bir said:


> *@Bilal9*
> *SENIOR MEMBER*
> *Salam brother, out of my sheer respect towards a reputable/knowledgeable distinguished member like you and as a reflection of good faith, from now onwards I am willing to refrain posting the reverse side of the coin in a thread created by you.While, I am also earnestly requesting to highlight the plight faced by us the City dwellers,irrespective of their social classification.
> My humble request to all reputed PDF members, would be NOT to use this enlightened forum as a propaganda tool/Goebbels deceitful lies, by the RAWami goons. *



Thanks Bhai - I appreciate your decency and well-thought consideration. Well-noted.

*15 new 5-star hotels in next 3 years*
*Jasim Uddin 9th September, 2017 02:37:30




*


Several international hotel chains have taken up plans to expand their business in Bangladesh to cater for the growing need for luxury accommodation in Dhaka and other popular locations across the country.

According to industry sources, 15 more 5-star hotels will be set up in Bangladesh over the next three years to help the hospitality sector get along with the development thrust as the country pushes on plans to become a middle-income economy by 2021.

Apart from tourists, a large number of foreign buyers, diplomats, government and international agency employees, and business travellers visit Bangladesh regularly.

The existing 5-star hotels cannot fully accommodate the international guests.

The demand for luxury accommodation facility will rise further as the government has been working to attract more foreign tourists to boost the country’s tourism sector.

At present, there are seven 5-star hotels in the country, having a little over 1600 suites and rooms, which can accommodate around 2000 guests.

Of these, Intercontinental Hotel, the oldest one in the country, is now undergoing renovations and is likely to reopen in February 2018.

Pan Pacific Sonargaon Hotel has 277 suites and rooms, the Westin Dhaka has 235, Radisson Blu Dhaka Water Garden 200, Le Meridien Dhaka 304 and Four Points by Sheraton 149 suites and rooms.

The Radisson Blue Chittagong Bay View boasts of 241 suites and rooms with pleasing views of the commercial capital.

There was a time when only two luxury hotels -- Purbani in Dhaka and Agrabad in Chittagong -- were operating in the country. The two hotels are still operating along with many others across the country in the 3-star category.

Over the years, many investors have come forward to develop international luxury chain hotels to serve the growing number of tourists arriving in the country.

Hospitality industry experts said the completion of the would-be ventures would provide enormous opportunities and a big boost to the hospitality industry in Bangladesh.

The international hotel chains which are expanding business in Bangladesh include Hotel Sheraton, Holiday Inn, JW Marriott, Swiss Hotel, Hyatt Regency, Element Hotel, Saint Regis Hotel, Hilton Hotel and Dusit Hotel.

They will operate 5-star hotels built by local entrepreneurs in capital Dhaka, port city Chittagong, tourist town Cox Bazar and divisional cities like Khulna and Mymensingh.

The upcoming ventures will offer around 4,000 5-star standard rooms and suites apart from other facilities.

“With the expansion of Bangladesh’s economy, the demand for luxury accommodation is increasing.

The existing luxury hotels are inadequate to fulfil the demands of the growing number of guests in Bangladesh," said Md Al-Amin, Director of Sales and Marketing at Westin Dhaka.

“At present, capital Dhaka has only 1,200 rooms in five luxury hotels, which are not enough to cater for the growing need of the guests seeking 5-star accommodation,” he said, adding that the average occupancy rate at these hotels is 70-72 percent.

Luxury hotels are usually build by local entrepreneurs while international hotel chains operate them under profit sharing arrangement.

Hospitality industry insiders said US-based global hotel chain Marriot International has partnered with two Bangladeshi companies for operating two 5-star hotels, one each in Dhaka and Chittagong.

Marriott International has signed agreements with Jamuna Builders Limited, a real estate concern of the Jamuna Group, to operate a 700-room JW Marriott Hotel in Dhaka and with Pacific Jeans, one of the leading premium jeans manufacturers, for another 250-room Marriott in Chittagong.

"We’re very hopeful of launching our hotel by the end of next year,” said Monika Islam, Director of Jamuna Group, while talking to the daily sun.

Syed M Tanvir, Director of Pacific Jeans Ltd, told the daily sun: “We’re taking necessary preparation to launch the hotel, hopefully by January next year.”

Unique Hotel and Resorts Ltd, the owner of Westin Dhaka, will build another four 5-star standard hotels at Gulshan, Banani and Uttara in the capital.

“There will be an Element Hotel at Uttara with 80 rooms, Sheraton Hotel at Banani with 250 rooms and St Regis Hotel and Hyatt Regency at Gulshan each having 220 rooms,” Westin Dhaka’s Sales and Marketing Director Md Al-Amin said.

Global hotel chains Holiday Inn and Marium Group are expecting to launch their branches in Dhaka in February 2018.

Bengal Group of Industries and Swissotel struck a deal to build the Swissotel Dhaka at Gulshan-Tejgaon Link Road in the capital. The Swissotel Dhaka will feature 375 guest rooms and suites.

Md Jashim Uddin, Vice-chairman of Bengal Group of Industries, told the daily sun: "It’ll be the first project of Swissotel Hotel in Bangladesh. The hotel is scheduled to open in 2020.”

Index Holdings Ltd, a concern of Index Companies, has signed a MoU to become the local franchise of US-based global chain Best Western Hotels and Resorts.

As per the agreement, both the enterprises will invest in hotel business under joint-venture arrangement through local and international financing companies and their establishments will feature rooms and suites in 3-star, 4-star and 5-star categories.

“We’ve a plan to offer 426 quality rooms across the country under 5-star, 4-star and of 3-star categories which will be launched by next two and a half years. Both of our hotels and resorts will be located near the 300 feet road adjacent to Bashundhara Residential Area,” a representative of the Index Holdings has said.

Another 4-star hotel will be launched in Rajshahi town with 64 rooms and a 3-star resort will be built in Rajendrapur adjacent to the national park with 52 rooms, he said.

Best Holdings Limited, the owner of Hotel Le Meridian, is working on a plan to build a resort in its Valuka Agro Project in Mymensingh. Le Meridian Bhaluka Resort and Spa is scheduled to open in January 2019 with more than 200 rooms. The 400-acre resort will feature lush green and scenic beauty.

Hilton Worldwide signed a management agreement with Premier Hotels and Resorts to manage Hilton Dhaka at Gulshan with 250 rooms.

Dusit International, one of Thailand's leading hotel and property development companies, is set to expand its global footprint with the opening of Dusit Princess Dhaka with 90 rooms, the company's first property in Bangladesh, under a long-term arrangement with a subsidiary of Lakeshore Hotels Limited.

The hotel will boast of 80 guest rooms and 10 suites in a 13-storey building at Uttara.

Radisson, which is operated in Bangladesh under joint venture between US-based Carlson Hotels Worldwide and Chittagong-based Clewiston Group, will build a 350-room 5-star hotel on Kalatoli beach in Cox's Bazar.

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## Mage

Bilal9 said:


> Thanks Bhai - I appreciate your decency and well-thought consideration. Well-noted.
> 
> *15 new 5-star hotels in next 3 years*
> *Jasim Uddin 9th September, 2017 02:37:30
> 
> 
> 
> *
> 
> 
> Several international hotel chains have taken up plans to expand their business in Bangladesh to cater for the growing need for luxury accommodation in Dhaka and other popular locations across the country.
> 
> According to industry sources, 15 more 5-star hotels will be set up in Bangladesh over the next three years to help the hospitality sector get along with the development thrust as the country pushes on plans to become a middle-income economy by 2021.
> 
> Apart from tourists, a large number of foreign buyers, diplomats, government and international agency employees, and business travellers visit Bangladesh regularly.
> 
> The existing 5-star hotels cannot fully accommodate the international guests.
> 
> The demand for luxury accommodation facility will rise further as the government has been working to attract more foreign tourists to boost the country’s tourism sector.
> 
> At present, there are seven 5-star hotels in the country, having a little over 1600 suites and rooms, which can accommodate around 2000 guests.
> 
> Of these, Intercontinental Hotel, the oldest one in the country, is now undergoing renovations and is likely to reopen in February 2018.
> 
> Pan Pacific Sonargaon Hotel has 277 suites and rooms, the Westin Dhaka has 235, Radisson Blu Dhaka Water Garden 200, Le Meridien Dhaka 304 and Four Points by Sheraton 149 suites and rooms.
> 
> The Radisson Blue Chittagong Bay View boasts of 241 suites and rooms with pleasing views of the commercial capital.
> 
> There was a time when only two luxury hotels -- Purbani in Dhaka and Agrabad in Chittagong -- were operating in the country. The two hotels are still operating along with many others across the country in the 3-star category.
> 
> Over the years, many investors have come forward to develop international luxury chain hotels to serve the growing number of tourists arriving in the country.
> 
> Hospitality industry experts said the completion of the would-be ventures would provide enormous opportunities and a big boost to the hospitality industry in Bangladesh.
> 
> The international hotel chains which are expanding business in Bangladesh include Hotel Sheraton, Holiday Inn, JW Marriott, Swiss Hotel, Hyatt Regency, Element Hotel, Saint Regis Hotel, Hilton Hotel and Dusit Hotel.
> 
> They will operate 5-star hotels built by local entrepreneurs in capital Dhaka, port city Chittagong, tourist town Cox Bazar and divisional cities like Khulna and Mymensingh.
> 
> The upcoming ventures will offer around 4,000 5-star standard rooms and suites apart from other facilities.
> 
> “With the expansion of Bangladesh’s economy, the demand for luxury accommodation is increasing.
> 
> The existing luxury hotels are inadequate to fulfil the demands of the growing number of guests in Bangladesh," said Md Al-Amin, Director of Sales and Marketing at Westin Dhaka.
> 
> “At present, capital Dhaka has only 1,200 rooms in five luxury hotels, which are not enough to cater for the growing need of the guests seeking 5-star accommodation,” he said, adding that the average occupancy rate at these hotels is 70-72 percent.
> 
> Luxury hotels are usually build by local entrepreneurs while international hotel chains operate them under profit sharing arrangement.
> 
> Hospitality industry insiders said US-based global hotel chain Marriot International has partnered with two Bangladeshi companies for operating two 5-star hotels, one each in Dhaka and Chittagong.
> 
> Marriott International has signed agreements with Jamuna Builders Limited, a real estate concern of the Jamuna Group, to operate a 700-room JW Marriott Hotel in Dhaka and with Pacific Jeans, one of the leading premium jeans manufacturers, for another 250-room Marriott in Chittagong.
> 
> "We’re very hopeful of launching our hotel by the end of next year,” said Monika Islam, Director of Jamuna Group, while talking to the daily sun.
> 
> Syed M Tanvir, Director of Pacific Jeans Ltd, told the daily sun: “We’re taking necessary preparation to launch the hotel, hopefully by January next year.”
> 
> Unique Hotel and Resorts Ltd, the owner of Westin Dhaka, will build another four 5-star standard hotels at Gulshan, Banani and Uttara in the capital.
> 
> “There will be an Element Hotel at Uttara with 80 rooms, Sheraton Hotel at Banani with 250 rooms and St Regis Hotel and Hyatt Regency at Gulshan each having 220 rooms,” Westin Dhaka’s Sales and Marketing Director Md Al-Amin said.
> 
> Global hotel chains Holiday Inn and Marium Group are expecting to launch their branches in Dhaka in February 2018.
> 
> Bengal Group of Industries and Swissotel struck a deal to build the Swissotel Dhaka at Gulshan-Tejgaon Link Road in the capital. The Swissotel Dhaka will feature 375 guest rooms and suites.
> 
> Md Jashim Uddin, Vice-chairman of Bengal Group of Industries, told the daily sun: "It’ll be the first project of Swissotel Hotel in Bangladesh. The hotel is scheduled to open in 2020.”
> 
> Index Holdings Ltd, a concern of Index Companies, has signed a MoU to become the local franchise of US-based global chain Best Western Hotels and Resorts.
> 
> As per the agreement, both the enterprises will invest in hotel business under joint-venture arrangement through local and international financing companies and their establishments will feature rooms and suites in 3-star, 4-star and 5-star categories.
> 
> “We’ve a plan to offer 426 quality rooms across the country under 5-star, 4-star and of 3-star categories which will be launched by next two and a half years. Both of our hotels and resorts will be located near the 300 feet road adjacent to Bashundhara Residential Area,” a representative of the Index Holdings has said.
> 
> Another 4-star hotel will be launched in Rajshahi town with 64 rooms and a 3-star resort will be built in Rajendrapur adjacent to the national park with 52 rooms, he said.
> 
> Best Holdings Limited, the owner of Hotel Le Meridian, is working on a plan to build a resort in its Valuka Agro Project in Mymensingh. Le Meridian Bhaluka Resort and Spa is scheduled to open in January 2019 with more than 200 rooms. The 400-acre resort will feature lush green and scenic beauty.
> 
> Hilton Worldwide signed a management agreement with Premier Hotels and Resorts to manage Hilton Dhaka at Gulshan with 250 rooms.
> 
> Dusit International, one of Thailand's leading hotel and property development companies, is set to expand its global footprint with the opening of Dusit Princess Dhaka with 90 rooms, the company's first property in Bangladesh, under a long-term arrangement with a subsidiary of Lakeshore Hotels Limited.
> 
> The hotel will boast of 80 guest rooms and 10 suites in a 13-storey building at Uttara.
> 
> Radisson, which is operated in Bangladesh under joint venture between US-based Carlson Hotels Worldwide and Chittagong-based Clewiston Group, will build a 350-room 5-star hotel on Kalatoli beach in Cox's Bazar.


Still no five star in Noakhali?


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## Bilal9

Mage said:


> Still no five star in Noakhali?



Newcally will develop when Payra develops. There will be lots of EPZs/SEZs in that area. The hotels will appear when SEZs appear, some are already ready to go.

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## mb444

Mage said:


> Still no five star in Noakhali?




If there is a need one will pop up. Investors are not stupid they are not in the business of setting up white elephants....... build it and they will come rarely works in real life.



Banglar Bir said:


> *@Bilal9*
> *SENIOR MEMBER*
> *Salam brother, out of my sheer respect towards a reputable/knowledgeable distinguished member like you and as a reflection of good faith, from now onwards I am willing to refrain posting the reverse side of the coin in a thread created by you.While, I am also earnestly requesting to highlight the plight faced by us the City dwellers,irrespective of their social classification.
> My humble request to all reputed PDF members, would be NOT to use this enlightened forum as a propaganda tool/Goebbels deceitful lies, by the RAWami goons. *




I do not like getting into slanging matches. Personally post what you like if it's in keeping with the thread. 

There is no problem showing the reverse. Development often have a reverse impact and we should be mature enough to talk about it responsibly.

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## Banglar Bir

*Living insecure and lonely*
by Monwarul Islam | Published: 00:05, Nov 16,2017 | Updated: 01:04, Nov 16,2017



* 
WHILE talking to a doctor friend of mine, who is pursuing a higher degree in psychiatry, about a few days ago, I was astonished to find his cutting, edgy observation on the state of mental health of urban people who, in his words, are thronging the chambers of psychiatrists. *
He answered callously, when I asked him for the reason behind his pursuing higher degree in psychiatry, that the business of psychiatrists is booming as more people are suffering from different types of mental health issues. 

*To my further question why people are becoming more vulnerable to psychiatric problems, the would-be psychiatrist said, to summarise, that most of us are living with a compulsive and consistent sense of insecurity and loneliness.*

His cold and calculated answers, thrown a bit jokingly though, got on my nerves.
What he said is wholly true that we, hundreds of thousands, are living with a destabilising sense of insecurity, economic and otherwise, *and we are living lonely amidst the crowd.*

For a psychiatrist, this might mean a business prospect, to joke a little, *but it sheds light on a far deeper condition of our social and personal life.*

With our social lives torn and tossed, family ties severed or atomised, with precariousness being the defining factor of our economic state, with distrust having its toll on interpersonal relations, we are pushed to create shells around our private-personal lives and lock ourselves inside them. 
Out of these shells, we can no longer maintain real social contacts;* neither can the ethereal ones provide us with the needed warmth of togetherness.

As the would-be psychiatrist puts it — people are becoming more insecure and lonely and these two conditions define our hectic lives.*

Insecurity, as the word suggests, is lack of security, of stability, of a belief that you are in a firm position and have nothing to fear. Sadly we are living in a society where economic and political system is so designed as to fill us inevitably up with a sense of insecurity. 
*
The deepest sense of insecurity, for today’s urban people without a war to threaten their lives, is of the economic insecurity.* 

Well over a half of the working people in urban areas are insecure about their jobs, their income. Their income and their jobs are, at best, precarious. They have nothing or very little to stick to which can give them an identity, a profession-based identity. 

You are hired today to do a job; you will be fired tomorrow if your service is not needed. As a result, both of your profession-based identity and profession-generated skills are highly unlikely to sustain. As such, your attachment to the work you do is at best extraneous and fragile. 
*
You are nothing more than a ‘mechanistic part’ in your workplace. *The part you serve in your office or at work does not necessarily require the individual you. In such a condition, a worker’s position is definitely vulnerable and prone to exploitation and is bound to develop a riding sense of insecurity. 
*
The authorities will surely take the best advantages of this situation. They will make you work more and pay less. They will decide whether you are secure with them or not.*

In fact, the number of workers and officials with insecure, precarious jobs, not to mention the large number of the unemployed and the underemployed, is so fast increasing that a class which economist like Guy Standing and some others have named the ‘precariat’ appears to be in the making.

Standing’s 2011 book _The Precariat: the New Dangerous Class_ defines this class as a mass one characterised by chronic uncertainty and insecurity. 

Due to what the neoliberal, global market terms as ‘job/labour market flexibility’, which is in Guy Standing’s words, ‘an agenda for transferring risks and insecurity onto workers and employees’, there has been the creation of a global ‘precariat’, composed of many millions around the world without an anchor of stability. 

The descriptive term ‘precariat’ came into use in the hands of French sociologists during the 1980s, but seeing it as a class, or class-in-the-making as Guy Standing puts it, in the globalised era began very recently. 

Not to go deeper into Guy Standing’s elaborate and interesting stratification of the new class orders under the globalised economy, it is quite understandable that more people are being trapped into this precarity where chronic insecurity is the staple condition.

While writing on the range and volume of the class, Noam Chomsky, one of the leading thinkers of today, in his 2012 article ‘Plutonomy and the Precariat’, *goes as far as to say that except the handful wealthiest with access to power and control over politics and policies the whole lot of the rest are in the precariat, living their lives adrift and unstable.*

With no sight of sustainable development of life and career, with no let-up from the gnawing sense of insecurity, this class is led to live a life characterised by* alienation, anger, anxiety and anomie. Guy Standing succinctly says, ‘a life with four A’s’.*

Needless to say that a person of this class who experiences these four A’s is a lonely, alienated and detached man fighting his dogged fights round-the-clock to keep his fears at bay. 

Since the system, in its mechanic-systemic pull, is throwing us into a space of hostile competition and compulsive individualism where one’s gain inevitably makes others’ at stake, where we are in a war of every man against every man, we are losing the good-old values of living together. 

One can quite logically remember, in this connection, Karl Marx’s path-breaking explanation of alienation which explains workers’ alienation from their labour, from their productions, from each other and, most importantly, from their species-essence (guttungswesen). 

The last aspect of alienation, that is, alienation from what Marx termed guttungswesen (translated as species-essence or human nature) in his _Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts_ of 1844 (also known as the Paris Manuscripts) is related, in effect, to the other three aspects of alienation; and alienation from the ‘species-essence’(the natural way of living) is what turns, to be more accurate forces, the human nature into a mechanistic part in the mode of production. 

Society, as we understand it, is not any more a working concept as social spaces, meaning spaces of inter-personal communications and sharing, are just vaporising. Instead of social spaces, we are driven into a sort of a distorted private space where as persons we are inhabited by deep-rooted sense of insecurity and loneliness. 

Since the fundamental characteristic of humans as mammals with a history of shared living is no more with us, we are carrying wounded, irreparably damaged private lives making us prone to psychosis of one sort or another. 

*It is, therefore, no wonder that, according to a national survey, 16 per cent adults in the country, specially the urban adults, are suffering from some sort of mental health issues and, the doctor friend says, the number is increasing.*
Monwarul Islam is a cultural correspondent of New Age.
http://www.newagebd.net/article/28424/living-insecure-and-lonely

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## Banglar Bir

2:00 AM, November 16, 2017 / LAST MODIFIED: 12:19 AM, November 16, 2017
*Dhaka Attack of another kind*
*Destruction of country's heritage should be considered a crime*





This century-old laboratory building in Dhaka's Khamarbari area was demolished recently, despite a High Court order halting the demolition work. PHOTO: Star
Mamnoon Murshed Chowdhury
*While this year's hit Bangla movie Dhaka Attack was running to packed audiences, there was another kind of attack going on in the heart of Bangladesh's 400-year-old capital city. A demolition team, engaged by the Public Works Department, was razing to the ground a magnificent edifice built in 1909 for agricultural research, known as the Laboratory—the first of its kind in this part of Bengal.* 
A High Court bench had issued an order on October 26, Thursday, to halt demolition until the next Tuesday. Disregarding the order, demolition continued during the weekend at an astonishing speed. On Saturday afternoon, with more than half of the building still intact, a bulldozer was brought in. 
Within hours, its brutal blades reduced the 108-year-old structure to rubble. 
To any observer, the whole action would appear as one executed with monstrous rage to inflict maximum possible damage that makes the idea of re-building an utterly nonsensical one. 

Rewind ten years to 2007. This time the site was Narinda in Old Dhaka. Binat Bibi Mosque, Dhaka's oldest surviving mosque built during 1454-1457, was being demolished to make space for a larger, multi-storied one. The initiative was taken by none other than the “Mosque Committee.” The custodians had earlier been shown at least seven different architectural design proposals—extension schemes that did not require destruction of the historic structure. 

For reasons unknown, none of these were accepted. The Department of Archaeology, the government agency designated to identify and protect all things relevant to the history and culture of the land, could not stop the* merciless tearing down of the 550-year-old mosque*. This, as the Department was reported to have said at that time, was “not a protected site.” 
Ironically, neither was the Laboratory. 

A little over a month ago, a 200-year-old two-storied house built by Armenian merchant Nicholas Pogose was partly demolished before conservationists obtained a court order to prevent it. Niki Shaheb er Kuthi is of significant archaeological importance, but not listed as such. Last year, the 300-year-old Azimpur Old Graveyard Mosque was all but destroyed to give way to a newer edifice. 
*
The mosque was stated to be the last surviving example of an Ottoman-influenced structure with single dome and flanking half-domed vaults.* This, again, was not a protected structure. In 2015, a 300-year-old Mughal-era residential building in Shakhari Bazar was almost razed before DoA intervened. Known as Holding No 64, the building was among the 142 buildings listed for protection in the area. During the past seven years, as The _Guardian _reported in March 2017, more than 500 such historic buildings in Old Dhaka have been demolished. The same report made a chilling prediction about the surviving ones—that Dhaka's “building frenzy would happily claim the rest.” 

*Dhaka appears set to become a city without memories, a city that claims to have 400 years of history but retains little architectural evidence to support it. As our heritage faces a two-pronged attack—from the government and individual owners—there is little doubt that a tragic cultural bankruptcy awaits us. *

Unfortunately, the demolitions seldom make headlines in the press, or generate active, sustained protest from the people. It is always a small group of conservationists and conscientious citizens leading the often-futile resistance. Their actions at times trigger hostile reactions, and as seen in the Laboratory case, prompt the bulldozers to work double time. The contemporary society, with its architects and artists, poets and politicians, maintains a blasé indifference to the authenticity of a conservationist's arguments. Judges and journalists are, therefore, his last resort.
*
But when and how did this corrosive nihilism creep into our collective psyche?* Is this phenomenon an inevitable consequence of our destruction of political institutions? 
*Or is it the economy? Whatever the reason*, it is a fact that we are comfortable with a depleted state of mind that values money over memories.

Speaking of facts, let us admit that the owners of historic buildings are often in a financial quagmire. With no government initiative to transform a heritage into financially rewarding usage, an inherited property loses its development potential when declared as “protected.” The owners feel unjustly deprived and attempt to get the buildings certified as “unsafe” that merit demolition. 

A sustained campaign over the years to create earthquake impact awareness has not helped the cause of conservation. Often, those leading such campaigns are unacquainted with, or insensitive to, the cultural importance of an area or a building, and hastily prescribe demolition instead of retrofitting.

At the institutional level, there is something terribly amiss with our mindset. Heritage buildings are not held in high esteem. The British can afford to build a new Parliament. Harvard University can take down the 300-year-old Massachusetts Hall to build a high rise. Maharashtra government can opt for a smart communication hub in place of Victoria Terminus. Instead, they have learnt to utilise heritage as a capital. 

In Dhaka, schools having buildings that date back to early or mid-20th century are attempting to tear them down. The owners of the now-demolished Laboratory building had acres of land at their disposal to develop a master plan with new buildings while proudly highlighting the historic ones. But, evidently, they have no regard for the jewels they possess. The architects working for the government, people who are expected to be sensitive about such issues, did not, or could not, deter the owners either, and instead played the role of a strong supporting cast.

So, is there a win-win solution that can save Dhaka from sinking into heritage bankruptcy? Certainly, there is. Conservation strategists do not need to reinvent the wheel as there are effective tools in use all over the world. One such tool is the concept of Transfer of Development Rights [TDR]. It is a programme that encourages owners of properties marked protected from development to voluntarily sell the development rights to another person or entity, who will then be allowed to utilise the rights to build more than normally permitted at another location. 

*A plot owner in Dhanmondi can buy the development rights of a historic building in Shakhari Bazar and obtain permission from the government to build certain additional floors. The owner of the Shakhari Bazar building retains the ownership of land and can continue using it without further development. 

In cities with skyrocketing property prices like New York and Mumbai*, *TDR is put into use not only to protect heritage sites, but also to protect farmlands and slums. *It is unfortunate that many precious years have passed since RAJUK was introduced to the concept of TDR. Dhaka keeps on paying the price in terms of lost heritage as RAJUK delays inserting TDR provisions in the Imarat Nirman Bidhimala.

*“National pride is to countries what self-respect is to individuals: a necessary condition for self-improvement,” *wrote the philosopher Richard Rorty in 1998. As Bangladesh continues to advance on the economic front, a wanton disregard in preserving its heritage only hurts our national pride. The diabolic antihero of the Dhaka Attack movie wanted to blow up Dhaka's landmark buildings, like the National Assembly and High Court, only to be thwarted by the antics of two brave law enforcers. 
*
One only hopes that RAJUK and the Department of Archaeology will act heroically to save our historically significant buildings from demolition by the senseless quarters. 
Buildings are poignant palettes of national identity, history and memories. 
We should not lose them*.
Mamnoon Murshed Chowdhury is an architect based in Dhaka.
http://www.thedailystar.net/opinion/perspective/dhaka-attack-another-kind-1491883

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## Bilal9

American International University-Bangladesh *(**AIUB) Permanent Campus at Kuril (partially finished with high-rises yet to be built)































































*

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## BDforever

Bilal9 said:


> Thanks Bhai - I appreciate your decency and well-thought consideration. Well-noted.
> 
> *15 new 5-star hotels in next 3 years*
> *Jasim Uddin 9th September, 2017 02:37:30
> 
> 
> 
> *
> 
> 
> Several international hotel chains have taken up plans to expand their business in Bangladesh to cater for the growing need for luxury accommodation in Dhaka and other popular locations across the country.
> 
> According to industry sources, 15 more 5-star hotels will be set up in Bangladesh over the next three years to help the hospitality sector get along with the development thrust as the country pushes on plans to become a middle-income economy by 2021.
> 
> Apart from tourists, a large number of foreign buyers, diplomats, government and international agency employees, and business travellers visit Bangladesh regularly.
> 
> The existing 5-star hotels cannot fully accommodate the international guests.
> 
> The demand for luxury accommodation facility will rise further as the government has been working to attract more foreign tourists to boost the country’s tourism sector.
> 
> At present, there are seven 5-star hotels in the country, having a little over 1600 suites and rooms, which can accommodate around 2000 guests.
> 
> Of these, Intercontinental Hotel, the oldest one in the country, is now undergoing renovations and is likely to reopen in February 2018.
> 
> Pan Pacific Sonargaon Hotel has 277 suites and rooms, the Westin Dhaka has 235, Radisson Blu Dhaka Water Garden 200, Le Meridien Dhaka 304 and Four Points by Sheraton 149 suites and rooms.
> 
> The Radisson Blue Chittagong Bay View boasts of 241 suites and rooms with pleasing views of the commercial capital.
> 
> There was a time when only two luxury hotels -- Purbani in Dhaka and Agrabad in Chittagong -- were operating in the country. The two hotels are still operating along with many others across the country in the 3-star category.
> 
> Over the years, many investors have come forward to develop international luxury chain hotels to serve the growing number of tourists arriving in the country.
> 
> Hospitality industry experts said the completion of the would-be ventures would provide enormous opportunities and a big boost to the hospitality industry in Bangladesh.
> 
> The international hotel chains which are expanding business in Bangladesh include Hotel Sheraton, Holiday Inn, JW Marriott, Swiss Hotel, Hyatt Regency, Element Hotel, Saint Regis Hotel, Hilton Hotel and Dusit Hotel.
> 
> They will operate 5-star hotels built by local entrepreneurs in capital Dhaka, port city Chittagong, tourist town Cox Bazar and divisional cities like Khulna and Mymensingh.
> 
> The upcoming ventures will offer around 4,000 5-star standard rooms and suites apart from other facilities.
> 
> “With the expansion of Bangladesh’s economy, the demand for luxury accommodation is increasing.
> 
> The existing luxury hotels are inadequate to fulfil the demands of the growing number of guests in Bangladesh," said Md Al-Amin, Director of Sales and Marketing at Westin Dhaka.
> 
> “At present, capital Dhaka has only 1,200 rooms in five luxury hotels, which are not enough to cater for the growing need of the guests seeking 5-star accommodation,” he said, adding that the average occupancy rate at these hotels is 70-72 percent.
> 
> Luxury hotels are usually build by local entrepreneurs while international hotel chains operate them under profit sharing arrangement.
> 
> Hospitality industry insiders said US-based global hotel chain Marriot International has partnered with two Bangladeshi companies for operating two 5-star hotels, one each in Dhaka and Chittagong.
> 
> Marriott International has signed agreements with Jamuna Builders Limited, a real estate concern of the Jamuna Group, to operate a 700-room JW Marriott Hotel in Dhaka and with Pacific Jeans, one of the leading premium jeans manufacturers, for another 250-room Marriott in Chittagong.
> 
> "We’re very hopeful of launching our hotel by the end of next year,” said Monika Islam, Director of Jamuna Group, while talking to the daily sun.
> 
> Syed M Tanvir, Director of Pacific Jeans Ltd, told the daily sun: “We’re taking necessary preparation to launch the hotel, hopefully by January next year.”
> 
> Unique Hotel and Resorts Ltd, the owner of Westin Dhaka, will build another four 5-star standard hotels at Gulshan, Banani and Uttara in the capital.
> 
> “There will be an Element Hotel at Uttara with 80 rooms, Sheraton Hotel at Banani with 250 rooms and St Regis Hotel and Hyatt Regency at Gulshan each having 220 rooms,” Westin Dhaka’s Sales and Marketing Director Md Al-Amin said.
> 
> Global hotel chains Holiday Inn and Marium Group are expecting to launch their branches in Dhaka in February 2018.
> 
> Bengal Group of Industries and Swissotel struck a deal to build the Swissotel Dhaka at Gulshan-Tejgaon Link Road in the capital. The Swissotel Dhaka will feature 375 guest rooms and suites.
> 
> Md Jashim Uddin, Vice-chairman of Bengal Group of Industries, told the daily sun: "It’ll be the first project of Swissotel Hotel in Bangladesh. The hotel is scheduled to open in 2020.”
> 
> Index Holdings Ltd, a concern of Index Companies, has signed a MoU to become the local franchise of US-based global chain Best Western Hotels and Resorts.
> 
> As per the agreement, both the enterprises will invest in hotel business under joint-venture arrangement through local and international financing companies and their establishments will feature rooms and suites in 3-star, 4-star and 5-star categories.
> 
> “We’ve a plan to offer 426 quality rooms across the country under 5-star, 4-star and of 3-star categories which will be launched by next two and a half years. Both of our hotels and resorts will be located near the 300 feet road adjacent to Bashundhara Residential Area,” a representative of the Index Holdings has said.
> 
> Another 4-star hotel will be launched in Rajshahi town with 64 rooms and a 3-star resort will be built in Rajendrapur adjacent to the national park with 52 rooms, he said.
> 
> Best Holdings Limited, the owner of Hotel Le Meridian, is working on a plan to build a resort in its Valuka Agro Project in Mymensingh. Le Meridian Bhaluka Resort and Spa is scheduled to open in January 2019 with more than 200 rooms. The 400-acre resort will feature lush green and scenic beauty.
> 
> Hilton Worldwide signed a management agreement with Premier Hotels and Resorts to manage Hilton Dhaka at Gulshan with 250 rooms.
> 
> Dusit International, one of Thailand's leading hotel and property development companies, is set to expand its global footprint with the opening of Dusit Princess Dhaka with 90 rooms, the company's first property in Bangladesh, under a long-term arrangement with a subsidiary of Lakeshore Hotels Limited.
> 
> The hotel will boast of 80 guest rooms and 10 suites in a 13-storey building at Uttara.
> 
> Radisson, which is operated in Bangladesh under joint venture between US-based Carlson Hotels Worldwide and Chittagong-based Clewiston Group, will build a 350-room 5-star hotel on Kalatoli beach in Cox's Bazar.


you must open new thread on this news

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## Bilal9

BDforever said:


> you must open new thread on this news



Shall do brother.

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## Bilal9

Some new project renders...courtesy of StudioDXine

Navana Project












Transcom Corporate HQ






Army Tea Bar at Dhaka Cantonment





*Agrani Bank HQ proposal*


















Some recent interior projects....courtesy of ParadigmBD

NRB BANK, MOTIJHEEL

















BACH BANGLADESH AUTOMATED CLEARING HOUSE















*Ranks Ekannabarti, Badda*

10 storied 834-1826 sq. ft. unit apartment building w/ one level for underground parking (48 spaces), rooftop swimming pool, water body & fountain, children's playground, prayer space, jogging track and community space

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## Homo Sapiens



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