Rickshaw rights: the World Bank vs. entrepreneurs.

• Author: Howley, Kerry
• Position: Citings - Brief Article

WHEN FLOODS submerged parts of Bangladesh last monsoon season, thousands of villagers fled to the capital, Dhaka, where many found work driving the city's 89,000 rickshaws. Now those drivers are being driven off their territory again this time by World Bank backed bureaucrats who want to push the bicycle taxis off the city's main thoroughfares.

Dhaka banned rickshaws from Mirpur Road in December, and the local transport board plans to restrict other major arteries soon. The move is part of a larger Dhaka Urban Transport Project, funded by the World Bank, that's meant to support the "development of a new and modern infrastructure." Opponents say the project favors the rich, who can afford private cars and taxis, over the poor and middleclass Bangladeshis who own, operate, and ride in rickshaws.

"It's a flat-out class issue," says Waiter Hook, executive director of the Institute for Transport Development Policy...