Chittagong Bureau

The Chittagong Elevated Expressway has been named after Wasim Akram to remember the martyrs of the Chittagong July Uprising for future generations, said Housing and Public Works Adviser Adilur Rahman Khan.

He said, to remember the martyrs in the anti-discrimination movement, various institutions are being named after the martyrs. From now on, ten types of vehicles have started plying through the expressway with toll.

Chittagong's first elevated expressway has started commercial traffic on Friday.

Adilur Rahman Khan, Advisor to the Ministry of Taxation, Housing and Public Works, inaugurated the toll collection process at the Patenga end of the expressway in the morning.

Earlier it was named after the former Chittagong City Mayor late ABM Mohiuddin Chowdhury.

The expressway has been opened for trial vehicles since August 28. At present no toll is being collected from vehicles.

According to CDA sources, 10 types of vehicles will run on the expressway. But motorcycles and tailor cars will not run. Among them, private car 80, jeep 100, microbus 100, pickup 150, minibus 200, bus 280, truck (four wheeler) 200, truck (six wheeler) 300, covered van 500 and autorickshaw 30 tolls.

Talking to the engineers of CDA and contracting company, it is known that the length of this elevated expressway towards Chittagong Shah Amanat International Airport was supposed to be 16.5 kilometers. At present it is 15.2 kilometers. In the initial survey, 20 ramps (vehicular ramps) were to be constructed, but 14 have been constructed. The construction company has eliminated five more unnecessary ramps from this. At present, vehicles will move through 9 ramps. The total length of the ramp is set at 12 km but in reality only half of it is there. The CDA project is being implemented by Bangladeshi contractor Max Infrastructure Limited and Chinese contractor Rankin.

The expressway was scheduled to open in June 2020. Later it was changed to June 2024. Currently, the time has been extended by one more year till June 30, 2025. The then Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina inaugurated it on November 14, 2023 through a video conference before the completion of the construction work.

Project officials said that when the Ekneke project was approved in 2017, the project was scheduled to be completed within three years at a cost of Tk 3,250 crore. Although the construction work was inaugurated in the middle of 2018, the construction work started on February 24, 2019.

By revising the design in 2022, the cost was increased by another 1 thousand 48 crores and the period was extended till June 2024. However, as the work is not completed, the latest project has been extended by one year to June 2025