RAJSHAHI, May 11, 2018 (BSS) – Physical infrastructure works of footpath and road construction are underway in Rajshahi city with the main thrust of making its pedestrian movement unhindered together with ensuring a clean environment.
“We are constructing 20 kilometers of footpaths with financial support from Indian government”, said Ashraful Haque, Chief Engineer of Rajshahi City Corporation (RCC), here Thursday.
Land acquisition, road widening, drain and footpath construction and beautification are going on under a project being implemented with an estimated cost of around Taka 400 crore.
There will be no road and street without footpath in the metropolis. Thereby, pedestrian movement will be easier side by side with ensuring beautification. “We are decorating all the footpaths with colourful tiles in phases,” Engineer Ashraful Haque added.
The venture will be the epoch-making step of the city’s development field upon successful completion of the works by June next.
More than 32,000 poor and slum households are provided sanitation facilities by commissioning of 11,000 hygienic latrines in the metropolis.
Similarly, they are getting facilities of safe drinking water from 2,300 tube-wells installed in the slum areas besides different other settlement improvement privileges like footpaths and drains.
The city authorities have long been carrying out tree plantation and promotion of best practices for improving air quality and maintaining environment, said Mosaddique Hossain Bulbul, Mayor of RCC.
“We planted more than 5,000 trees on 10-kilomter roads and encouraged citizens for building fruit orchards. The corporation won the prime minister’s national award for tree plantation in 2009, 2010, 2011 and 2013,” he said.
The city corporation is also implementing a project titled ‘Zero soil’ to cover all the available top soils with green and various trees,” Mayor Bulbul said adding that more than 14,000 Neem tree saplings were distributed among school students free of cost recently for transplantation.
The corporation is constructing footpaths covering the open soil on roadsides, improving the drainage system, increasing mango orchards and beefing up the cleansing operations, the mayor said. RCC’s practice of household waste removal and dumping those to a remote place has also contributed to reducing environmental pollution.
“We have separate arrangement for collection of medical wastes from both public and private clinics and diagnostic centers and hygienic management of those,” said Sheikh Mamun, Chief Conservancy Officer.
“The emerged greenery in and around Rajshahi city would instantly catch one’s eyesight if anybody notices the city’s topography from an airplane or any multistoried building,” said Prof Redwanur Rahman of Institute of Environmental Sciences in Rajshahi University.
Massive afforestation and other activities for greenery in the past 10 to 12 years contributed a lot towards reducing the air pollution in the city, he added.