Today, First passenger train runs on Jamuna Railway Bridge. Photo: BSS

   SIRAJGANJ, Feb 12, 2025 (BSS) – Bangladesh Railway today ran its first train with passengers onboard on the newly built dual gauge double line railway bridge on the River Jamuna.

    “The much-awaited train operation on the newly built railway bridge over the Jamuna River has begun with Dhaka-bound intercity train ‘Silk City Express’ crossing it at 11:17am,” project director of the bridge Al Fattah M Masudur Rahman said.

   He said the train took 10 minutes to cross the bridge 4.8 kilometres long bridge with a speed of 50 kilometre per hour (kph) though the bridge was constructed with the capacity of bearing carriages with 120 kph.

   The trains so far needed 20 kph to cross the existing train bridge as an extended structure of the Jamuna Multi Purpose Bridge.

   The official, however, said the dedicated railway bridge was set to be opened formally on March 18.

   The new dedicated railway bridge is located 300 metres upstream of the Jamuna Multipurpose Bridge.

   The project director said at least 88 trains will be able to cross the country’s longest railway bridge at high speeds.

   The trial run was carried out earlier on the bridge when a train crossed it at a speed of 120 kph.

   Since opening of the Jamuna Multipurpose Bridge in 1998 some 38 trains have been crossing daily connecting the central part of Bangladesh including Dhaka with north, northwestern, southern and southwestern regions.

   Railway officials said the government decided to constructed the dedicated railway bridge in 2020 while its foundation stone was laid on November 29 of the same year.

   The structure was built at a cost of Tk. 16,780.96 crore, 72.4 percent of which was provided by Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) as loan while the government provided the rest of the amount.

   Japan’s OTG and IHI constructed the bridge as joint venture project.

   The bridge required 7.667 kilometres of approach embankment and loop and 30.73 kilometres of railway tracks.

    He said until March 18, one of the two tracks on the bridge would be used for train movement in both directions and after its formal inauguration trains will run on both the tracks.