The north-south traffic flow was severely hampered because the existing train lines converging at the Phulbaria railway station cut roads at various points. The existing railway line bifurcated the capital into the old city and the new city, expanding northward. However, the train track did not affect the flow of vehicular traffic to and from the area because, the city's total traffic volume was rather small.ĭuring the early 20th century, Dhaka's urban status rose, and its economy grew, even more so after 1947, when it became the provincial capital of East Pakistan. The railway line leading to Phulbaria formed a semi-circular northern barrier of the city.
It was a rudimentary facility with one platform, a small yard, and a locomotive shed. The railway station constructed at Phulbaria, demarcating the northern extent of Dhaka, served only the people in and around the urban area. Still considered a provincial town at that time, Dhaka's railway infrastructure was nominal. However, the province east of the Padma River, including such urban centres as Dhaka, Chittagong, and Sylhet, long remained deprived of the benefits of railway because the extensive river system of the deltaic country created geographic logistical issues.Įven by 1885, the only railway line on the eastern side of the Padma was the one connecting Dhaka and the northern town of Mymensingh. Called the Eastern Bengal Railway, this expansion of train service to East Bengal signalled a new phase in the growth of the region's colonial economy. The first railway line in East Bengal-connecting Kolkata with the western Bangladeshi town of Kushtia-was introduced in 1862. To understand the significance of Kamalapur, one needs to understand the history of railway in this country. Not only was it the largest modern railway station in the country, but it also embodied the modernist spirit in architecture that defined the decade of the 1960s. " The inauguration of the new railway station at Kamalapur on April 27, 1968, introduced a new chapter in the history of railway transportation in East Pakistan, now Bangladesh. They were the products of what the military regime of Muhammad Ayub Khan called the "Decade of Development" (1958-68), intertwined with West Pakistan's shrewd political strategy of placating East Pakistan's agitating Bengalis through architectural and infrastructure development.
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These buildings also had a political history. Along with Louis Kahn's Parliament building, Constantino Doxiadis' TSC, and Richard Vrooman's Architecture Building at BUET, among others, the pioneering structure of the railway station symbolised a "golden age" of architecture in Bangladesh during the 1960s. The station's parabolic umbrella roof over the terminal was unusual for its time. If you catch a train ride from this station or pass by it, you would notice that it is not one of those familiar colonial-era red-brick buildings that typically served as railway stations across South Asia.
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He was a gentleman, courteous, cautious, and sounded a tad melancholic about his memories of Dhaka.īoughey was one of the two designers of the Kamalapur Railway Station (the other was Daniel Dunham). Every time I visit the Kamalapur Railway Station, I think of what he described to me a few years ago about the Dhaka of the 1960s. I didn't have a clue that Bob Boughey was alive and still working in Thailand.