Maintain the use of rickshaws by a) cancelling proposed new ban on rickshaws from different roads; b) creating rickshaw-only lanes on major streets (including those that currently ban rickshaws), and c) considering a gradual shift to improved rickshaws that are easier to manoeuvre and are more comfortable for passengers. If rickshaw licensing system is to be maintained, set a higher level for the number of rickshaws and base it on research into which all citizens can have input.
   Cancel all plans for future flyovers, and use transportation budgets to improve public transit and conditions for NMT.
   Make cars less affordable and available through reducing import of cars, raising
   registration fees and taxes, and restricting licenses.
   Ban cars from narrow streets and lanes and from congested areas, and reduce parking spaces for private automobiles. Enforce a ban on parking on footpaths and on major streets.
   Make cycling more safe and attractive by providing separate bicycle lanes on all major roads (creating a continuous cycle lane throughout the city) and by giving bicycles priority at traffic signals. Make cycling more affordable by greatly reducing the tariff on imported bicycles. Create more places to park bicycles.
   Increase bus use by creating special lanes for buses on major streets, banning all motorised vehicles except buses and emergency vehicles in congested areas, and considering other benefits to buses.
   Ensure conducive environment for walking by a) creating pedestrian-only zones in the central shopping and business districts, b) reducing motorised transport (pedestrians will naturally walk farther when the streets are quieter), c) cleaning up footpaths from construction debris and car parking (vendors actually attract pedestrians, and should be allowed to stay, though not to block the entire footpaths), and d) making footpaths more comfortable by planting more trees along them.
   Carry out awareness campaigns through mass media and other means (e.g. through leaflets distributed to school children) to encourage parents to walk or cycle rather than drive their children to school, and to consider more environment-friendly and social means of transport, e.g. public transit and walking/cycling rather than cars/auto-rickshaws.
   Support community programmes to convert underutilised streets into children’s playgrounds for a couple of hours each day, thereby making better use of roads in quieter neighbourhoods, and allowing children play space.
   Syed Siful Alam Shovan
   On e-mail

I praise the role the students played in 1952, 1969 and 1971. Those protests were noble, vital and sincere. That is not the case with student politics in recent times. The political protests of students nowadays are misguided and manipulated, bought and sold, violent and insincere. They and their teachers are no longer the conscience of the nation for the nation itself is far better educated now. Nowadays students are busy wounding each other with sticks and guns in the name of democracy. We bitterly criticise those students who lose their patience before the rest of the nation and whose leaders are busy earning black money doing politics.
   Ezajur Rahman
   Kuwait

It is very sad to see that the whole country, including the media, has got its priorities terribly wrong. The role of the media in this respect has to be stressed. The whole country is concerned about the state of emergency, the BNP factions, fair trials of politicians we already know to be corrupt, and, most of all, 'free and fair' elections. Wanting to end the state of emergency is perfectly understandable since the people's basic rights are suspended, but what use is of an election if we have the same old setup -- same parties, same (kind of) politicians and similar rules! But all this is insignificant to our main two problems which no one seems to talk much about:
   Overpopulation and climate change causing loss of land to an already small country. Do you seriously think an elected BNP or AL government is going to tackle these issues? With our population growth rate and loss of arable land, we are on a crash course towards famine and increased poverty. Current population growth will take us to 280 million by 2050....imagine that! And we are supposed to lose 1/3 of our land by then as well. The question to be asked is: who is going to tackle these problems?
   We seem to fuss a lot about whether our growth rate is 7.6 or 5 per cent, like it matters unless we can decrease pollution and population growth. My request to the media: please focus on and give more publicity of the problems mentioned above and come up with possible solutions.
   Amin
   On e-mail