Aela Callen of Worldfocus partner Al Jazeera English reports from Thailand.

Read what a Worldfocus contributing blogger had to say about the country’s attempts to curb traffic: Thailand’s Skytrain rides high; sets example for Asian transit

Thailand’s Skytrain.

Thailand’s Skytrain opened in 1999, in an effort to relieve the country’s crowded roads and frequent traffic jams. Last year, the government announced sprawling plans to improve infrastructure. 

However, economic worries and Thailand’s political upheaval have delayed some mass transit projects. 

Pichaya Fitts is a communications officer at the World Bank’s Thailand office. She describes how the Skytrain has impacted transport in Bangkok and argues that it sets an example for neighboring Asian countries. 

Bangkok’s Skytrain an example of the good infrastructure and services Thailand needs

At 2:30 p.m. on a weekday, the Skytrain in Bangkok, Thailand, was still pretty crowded. I squeezed myself into a small space near the doors, waiting to exit at the next stop. Suddenly, a cheery sound of music wafted through the air before a woman, standing not far from me, shouted a “Hello” into her tiny cellular phone.

“I’m on the train, two stops away from you,” she told the caller. “Will get there in a heartbeat.”

That got me thinking. Getting somewhere in a heartbeat was -– at least until 1999 –- a luxury no Bangkokian could afford (unless they owned a private helicopter). I remembered when this city’s traffic jams topped the list of things that would come to mind when people thought of Bangkok. (The next down in that list would probably be air pollution, but that’s a subject for a later discussion!).

Even now, the average vehicle speed in this city during the morning rush is roughly 18 kilometers (just over 10 miles) an hour. When I was working as a business reporter in the early 1990s, I had to allow between one and two hours for travel each time I had an appointment elsewhere in the city. Sitting idly in a taxi cab was a normal part of my everyday life then.

Things started to change dramatically after the Skytrain – what we call the elevated mass transit system here – was introduced eight years ago. It now takes me just a few minutes to get to my office from my apartment roughly two kilometers away. Before the Skytrain came along, the very same journey could take anywhere between 15-45 minutes. The Skytrain and the underground transit system we call MRT are making daily commutes by hundreds of thousand Bangkok residents much less stressful than in the past. I myself love being able to predict how long it will take me to get from Point A to Point B. It takes a lot of anxiety out of my everyday life.

When it comes to infrastructure development, Thailand has done very well compared with some other Southeast Asian neighbors. In fact, appropriate infrastructure, including access to power and water, has helped Thailand fuel rapid economic growth during the past three decades. Good infrastructure has made Thailand attractive to foreign investment, helped facilitate international trade, and improved the efficiency of everyday business activities. All of these led to more jobs, and more jobs led to more income for the poor. For some not-so-poor people, good infrastructure also helps them improve productivity or fulfill their lifestyles. In my line of work, staying connected with people around the globe and having easy access to public information are two very important elements. And I get to do this easily in Thailand, where high speed internet is no longer just luxury for a select few, unlike in some of the countries I had lived.

To read more, see the original post.

The views expressed by contributing bloggers do not reflect the views of Worldfocus or its partners.

For more on public transport in Asia, watch the Worldfocus signature story: “Singapore curbs traffic with automatic tolls”

Photo courtesy of Flickr user jo’nas under a Creative Commons license.

Yingxiu Elementary School in Sichuan Province, China.

Next week, it will be one year since China was shaken by a devastating earthquake in Sichuan Province. Up to 90,000 people were killed or went missing.

On Thursday at a news conference, officials released the names of 5,335 children who died, many of them in classrooms that crumbled in the quake. Previous unofficial estimates had put the number as high as 10,000.

The officials also said they found no evidence of shoddy school construction, as many residents have claimed. Parents and activists disputed the findings.

Worldfocus associate producer Hsin-Yin Lee translated several reactions posted on the Chinese-language news portal Sina: 

User 1: How about the investigation over those slipshod construction projects? A year has passed. Why are our school buildings so weak? The managing department is guilty of the most heinous crime for cuasing these families great pain.

User 2: It’s appropriate that the Sichuan province released the death toll after such a long period of time — it showed respect toward the dead and the feelings of the survivors.  

User 3: It is an extremely difficult task to figure out how many people have died in the massive earthquake. I am impressed by the death toll because it provided a precise number. I see respect toward every victim. I hope the dead can rest in peace.

Bloggers Bulbul Gupta and Pan Yi write that the government has been more open in the wake of the Sichuan quake than after prior natural disasters: 

The progress in reconstruction is a major achievement, but there has been something else of equal significance, and that is progress in the government’s approach to disaster management. It is markedly more open than it was during major natural disasters in the 1990s, in terms of providing information about reconstruction and in terms of coordinating and cooperating with the private sector, non-governmental organizations, and community groups on disaster relief and management. The government plans to mark the one year anniversary of the earthquake, known in China as “5-12,” with events to raise public awareness about disaster preparedness.

Chinese blogger Ai Weiwei differs, challenging the government’s credibility [translation]: 

The Sichuan government has destroyed itself again in front of world public [...]  I did not believe anything that you said today.

Michael Howe of the “Give2Asia” group writes that in the tragedy’s wake, communities came together:

The quake [...] marked as a turning point for Chinese philanthropy.

Prior to the earthquake, philanthropy in China was a concept and activity relegated to the ultra wealthy within the country, and to corporate philanthropy from domestic and international businesses. However, the earthquake changed all of that - beginning with a groundswell of support from tens of millions of Chinese people from all walks of life, as well as hundreds of millions of dollars in international aid.

Photo courtesy of Flickr user juliakao under a Creative Commons license.

A woman carries food from an aid organization in Liberia.

Though its civil war ended years ago, Liberia remains politically and economically unstable — and more may suffer as food and fuel prices rise around the world.

Glenna Gordon is a freelance writer and photographer currently based in Monrovia, Liberia. She has reported from Uganda, Kenya, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan and Rwanda and writes at the “Scarlett Lion” blog about encountering a trio of problems in Liberia: food, money and transportation.

Tryin’ Small

Before I came to Liberia, friends and colleagues warned me that it wouldn’t be easy. It isn’t. But in ways that are different than I expected.

FOOD

Thomas is a nice young man who comes to our house about once a week to wash clothes. On Tuesday, I asked him if he wouldn’t mind picking up a few things for us at the vegetable market. I don’t have time to go and haggle over the price of an avocado every week, and it’s a way for him to earn a little extra money.

He brought three moldy heads of cabbage, tiny onions (not the shallot kind, the picked-before-they-were-fully-mature kind), mushy potatoes already gone bad, instead of a pound of fresh tomatoes about a dozen small jars of tomato paste, and four avocados that won’t be ripe for at least a few weeks.

The best part was when I asked Thomas why he didn’t bring fresh tomatoes, he looked confused, and then asked me if I was referring to the “bush fruit.”

Fifteen dollars later, I plan to give all guests who visit my house over the next few weeks a small jar of tomato paste as a parting gift.

MONEY

There are no ATMs or banks linked to the international banking system in Liberia. That means no Visas, Master Card, Barclays, or any other bank card will get you cash if you stick the piece of plastic in a Liberian ATM. It’s all EcoBank, all the time.

I’ve been trying to get my bank at home to wire money to my EcoBank account. This isn’t easy. I have to fax them a form. There aren’t a lot of working fax machines in Liberia. Since that technology is based on land lines (which there aren’t) and became vogue in a tech era of yore (when Liberia was at war), this is difficult. My boyfriend found one, and faxed the form. The bank won’t accept it because it was a scan, and not a fax. I’m not sure how that happened.

Finally, through only slightly duplicitous means, we got money into our EcoBank account here. I went to the bank yesterday to withdraw. The bank’s computer system was down.

TRANSPORTATION

There isn’t really public transportation in Liberia in any sort of organized way. You can flag down a yellow taxi (literally a falling apart four door small vehicle), squeeze in the back where four people always sit, or in the front, where two people sit next to the driver, and pay about 5 LD for a ride (that’s Liberian Dollars equivalent to about eight American pennies). But, there aren’t enough taxis in town and you might wait up to an hour to catch a ride which may or may not take you where you need to go, since there are also no set taxi routes.

To read more, see the original post.

The views expressed by contributing bloggers do not reflect the views of Worldfocus or its partners.

Photo courtesy of Flickr user Peter Casierunder a Creative Commons license.

Tajik people have weathered harsh winters and shortages in electricity.

The International Crisis Group recently stated that Tajikistan, a small country bordering Afghanistan, is “on the road to failure.”

For the second winter in a row, the country is facing energy infrastructure problems. Hundreds of Tajiks died in the cold or went hungry last winter, due to electricity shortages and crop devastation. This year, the U.S. has pledged $5 million in emergency aid to help needy Tajiks.

Ilan Greenberg of the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting ventures to the Tajik capital, Dushanbe, and writes in the “Untold Stories” blog about the country’s crippling problems.

Dushanbe

On the Turkish Airlines flight into Dushanbe, the young American woman sitting next to me was enthusiastic about her next three days of personal freedom in Tajikistan. She is a political officer at the U.S. embassy in Afghanistan. “I’m looking forward to being able to walk around on streets,” she told me in a slight southern twang. “It will feel good to be in a normal city.”

Dushanbe comes off well when compared to, say, Kabul. But the Tajik capital fares less well in comparison to most other places. Running water and electricity are pretty constant in the tree-lined city center. But basic, working infrastructure degrades the farther it is from government ministries and the presidential residence dominating Dushanbe’s low rise urban nucleus. Drive just a few minutes and street lights stop working, apartment block windows flicker by minuscule candle light, and only the piercing of flashlights break the blackness in alleyways and courtyards.

The situation is even more dire outside Dushanbe’s city limits. Tajikistan’s borders are heavily patrolled by soldiers and guards (with significant assistance from American drug enforcement officials) trying to interdict the huge poppy smuggling coming out of neighboring Afghanistan in the south (or profit from it, in which case presumably without assistance from American drug enforcement officials) and with the smuggling of about everything else from Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan to the north and east.

The countryside is wracked by devastating problems – from catastrophic water and energy shortages to rampant child labor practices in the cotton fields to jobless villages where Tajik men returning from Russia face unending unemployment. Last winter was catastrophic for farmers – a devastating cold front moved into the country and stayed for months, knocking out the winter crop. People froze and went hungry. This winter was warmer, but farmers continue to buckle under the hardships of lack of accessible water, lack of electricity, and the widespread and enforced requirement to grow unprofitable and unsustainable cotton.

To read more, see the original post.

The views expressed by contributing bloggers do not reflect the views of Worldfocus or its partners.

Photo courtesy of Flickr user Brian Harrington Spier under a Creative Commons license.

Electricity is still a problem in Iraq.

Despite a reduction in violence and democratic elections in Iraq, the U.S. Department of State’s recently-released report on conditions in Iraq throughout 2008 stated that there is “widespread, severe corruption at all levels of government.”

Officials in the Iraqi government have embezzled an estimated $18 billion in American aid. On Monday, a dozen policemen were arrested in connection with a series of killings and kidnappings.

Nearly six years after the war began, Iraq still has many infrastructure problems, dealing with little electricity. Bloggers across Iraq describe the legacies of war in Iraq and discuss the state of its fledgling democracy.

Mohammed, an Iraqi dentist who has decided to take his pregnant wife to Jordan for delivery, describes the country’s decayed health sector:

I wish there is a person to blame or specific side to throw the blame on but unfortunately there are countless sides and people to throw the blame on…it’s all about corruption, decades of falling behind the medical developments, physicians and doctors with little medical ethics who will have high ethics when they leave Iraq, doctors who are really bad in their job but holds important positions because they are from a specific political party or they know “people”, sectarian violence, gangs working under the mask of religion, people with agenda of brain-killing Iraq…and the list goes on.

[...]About two months ago we applied for a visa to Jordan. Thank god we got it, we got the visa and we were approved for entering Jordan, I still can’t believe that this is possible; us getting to Jordan so that my wife could have a natural delivery with good medical care and overcome the medical disasters here.

Another blogger, IraqPundit, agrees that continued squabbling and corruption has deprived Iraqis of basic services:

Much like the rest of Iraq, the people of Basra want electricity, water, and they want the garbage to be collected. It’s clear the religious parties failed the people. Perhaps Iraqis will vote for new politicians who will actually provide basic services.

[...]My own family in Baghdad are indeed frustrated with the lack of services. But they don’t blame democracy, they blame the religious parties and corrupt politicians, and the terrorists who bombed electrical facilities promptly after they were repaired. Sure there was more water and electricity during Saddam Hussein’s era, but not that much more. If it was so great, why did we have all those generators?

The “Life is a Scrapbook” blog says that small-scale corruption and bribery is a part of daily life in Iraq:

It’s not called corruption, it’s called the cost of doing business. Recently a new regular style gas station opened near our brigade headquarters and not long after it did, the brigade commander’s personal security detachment roughed up a lot of the black market gasoline vendors and dumped their gas on the street. This action was within their legal right since the stands are illeal but was it a coincidence? New gas station opens; the local authority, the Army General, then roughs up the illegal vendors that had been ignored previously, add in that a week later the illegal vendors where back in full force. Do you think that there might have been some kick backs from both sets of gasoline vendors? I’m not saying there was, I just find it interesting [...] there might have been some money changing hands.

A journalist with NBC’s “World Blog” describes Iraqi war widows:

I recently visited the Iraqi Tourism Board to see some old friends and contacts. I went in smiling because I hadn’t been there for while and was excited to see my old friends, but the place had an eerie feel to it. It looked darker – and it was. In every room, when I popped in my head to say hello, there were women dressed in black from head to toe.

As a cup of coffee was placed in front of me, my curiosity finally got the better of me. I asked if a colleague had died or something? A woman covered in black responded, “They killed my husband and burned my home. So we moved to a Sunni neighborhood; stress and grief killed my mother a week later.”

I turned my head to the woman next to her and she said, “They killed my brother in front of his wife and children…just because he is Shiite living in a Sunni neighborhood.”

The smile I had on my face when I arrived was long gone. I actually felt ashamed that I had a smile on my face to start with. So, I chugged down my coffee and quickly left.

Photo courtesy of Flickr user michaelramallah under a Creative Commons license.

Rumor and superstition surrounds water in Liberia.

Liberia’s water supply was crippled during the country’s civil war when the main water treatment plant was destroyed. A 2006 report found that the majority of Liberian rely on untreated wells, rivers, ponds, creeks and swamps for drinking water.

But the water supply, already crippled by war, has been further harmed by widespread superstition and rumors.

Myles Estey is a journalist based in Monrovia, Liberia. He writes at “Esteyonage” about a recent scare there, when people became worried that the water would turn into blood.

Blood water

Last night, two things startled me. The first was Nigerian-manned tanks rolling past my house as I stayed up late typing - tanks are rarely a sign of a good thing. The second came waking at 3:45, only to see the bridge outside my house full of with people, and people filing under my balcony.

The bridge, most people say, should not be crossed by foot anytime after 11, and certainly not past midnight. A little surprising then that a line of people streamed across the bridge, under some of the only streetlamps in the country, and that many seemed to be women and children, not typical Also strange that most of them carried the 5-gallon water jugs that people collect their water from local wells in (running water remains rare). I struggled to come up with a reason for any of this, before drifting back to sleep, listening to the wind and a light rain that started.

This hazy memory remained lay buried until speaking with some reporters. It became clear that a ‘crisis’ gripped the city yesterday. A ‘report’ circulated, claiming that all the city’s water supplies would turn to blood by morning, though other variations claimed the water would become bitter, or perhaps dry up. People acted quickly, with reports of long lines all night at wells becoming especially feisty as dawn approached.

Origins of the report seem mixed. Truth FM definitely aired the first story about it during the day, but they were responding to already widespread knowledge, and callers comments. It spread ‘virally’, in 2.0 terminology, though without any more technology than word of mouth/cell phone. Brothers called sisters called cousins called friends called coworkers all through the night, with virtually everyone aware of the problem by dawn. Many residents stocked up with water.

“People here just believe anything,” a local journalist said of the situation. “They believe in powers and forces that don’t actually exist, just because someone told them so.”

To read more, see the original post.

The views expressed by contributing bloggers do not reflect the views of Worldfocus or its partners.

Photo courtesy of Flickr user MikeBlyth under a Creative Commons license.

Flooding in Itajai has left much of the Brazilian city underwater.

Floods in Brazil have killed at least 117 and driven more than 100,000 from their homes. Now, victims are beginning to return home, and President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has pledged to help rebuild the worst-hit areas.

Several months’ worth of rain fell on Brazil in under a week, leaving parts of the southern state of Santa Catarina underwater.

Global Voices Online posts accounts of Portuguese-language bloggers in affected areas — some forced to leave their homes – here and here.

The “Luz e Estilo” blog posts photos from Itajai, a city in Santa Catarina that witnessed some of the worst flooding.

The Itajai city government set up an information blog in the wake of the floods.

Blogger “Gschineider” visits Itajai and writes that people are trying to return to normal, though wary of continuing rain.

Blogger “Gringa in Rio” calls the floods the “Brazilian Katrina” and suggests that global warming is at fault.

Photo courtesy of Flickr user emarquetti under a Creative Commons license.

Haiti was hit hard by Hurricane Ike.

A school partially collapsed in Haiti today, the second in a week. Nine people were injured in the collapse and no one was trapped inside.

Last week, another school collapsed and killed at least 94. Officials admitted that the building had been rebuilt after starting to collapse earlier, renewing concerns about Haitian infrastructure.

Four hurricanes hit Haiti within the span of 30 days this summer, killing hundreds and leaving many cities uninhabitable and buildings destroyed.

The “Operation Green Leaves” blog discusses hurricane relief and urges the Haitian government to prioritize basic infrastructure to curb the impact of natural disasters, warning that international aid and celebrity attention are waning.

Ben Terrall of “Haiti Analysis” writes about widespread questions swirling around hurricane relief efforts, including a statement from Doctors Without Borders that blasted international response.

“The Haitian Blogger” strongly criticizes the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH) in the aftermath of the first school collapse, and blames the U.S. for destabilization after the bloody ouster of former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide in 2004.

The U.S. has sent search and rescue teams to the site of the first school collapse, but there are increasing calls to give Haitians temporary protected status (TPS).

Mark Schneider of the International Crisis Group writes at “World Politics Review” that TPS should be granted, and that the U.S. should be more involved in reconstruction efforts — pointing to comparitively large aid to Central America in the aftermath of Hurricane Mitch a decade ago.

Photo courtesy of Radio Nederland Wereldomroep under a Creative Commons license.

Brazil’s infrastructure has not kept up with its explosive economic growth over the past several years. Now, Brazil has embarked on a multi-billion dollar plan to correct the lack — a plan that has enormous implications for the country.

Brazil is the second largest producer of ethanol after the U.S., and expects to harvest 12 percent more cane than last year and increase exports by 25 percent. For more on worldwide use of ethanol and other fuel, see our map on global energy.

Producer Bryan Myers and correspondent Edie Magnus report on “Brazil Today” — a series that explores Brazil’s spiking conversion to Pentecostalism, its pioneering path toward energy independence and its improving — but expensive — roadways.

Producer Bryan Myers and correspondent Edie Magnus report from the roads of Brazil.

This piece was part of the Blueprint America project on infrastructure.

Read producer Bryan Myers’ blog posts from the field: Truckin’ through Brazil, Brazil plans to improve highways and Brazil privatizes its roadways.

An overturned bus alongside the BR 101 in Brazil.

Bryan Myers reported with Megan Thompson from Brazil on a story about roads and infrastructure.

Read Bryan’s other blog posts from the field: Truckin’ through Brazil and Brazil plans to improve highways.

As part of its plan to enlist private companies, the Brazilian government has leased several of its major highways to private companies, making those companies responsible for maintenance and repairs and, in return, allowing them to collect tolls. Currently, seven stretches of Brazilian highway are in private hands, and that number is expected to grow.

The tolls aren’t cheap. We took a drive on a highway that has already been privatized, the Rio de Janeiro to São Paulo highway. We paid $20 (U.S.) for the privilege of driving about 175 miles. That amounts to the daily take-home pay of the average Brazilian.

We also visited a highway that was being repaired in anticipation of being privatized — a highway running north from Rio de Janeiro to the town of Campos. A road crew was busy repaving the roadway with a soupy mixture of oil and stone, not the dense macadam Americans are accustomed to seeing on their highways.  The crew’s foreman told us that once his bosses put their toll booths in place, some members of his crew probably wouldn’t be able to afford to drive the very road they were helping to fix.

The debate about turning highways over to private hands mirrors one happening in America. Here too, some state and local governments are trying to privatize roads. A recent effort by officials in Pennsylvania to lease the Pennsylvania Turnpike — the first major road ever built in America — to a consortium led by banking giant Citigroup has been met with stiff resistance.

In America, at least, many believe the push to privatize flies in the face of the concept of “public works.”  Last year, a poll of Pennsylvania drivers showed the majority opposed to the idea. Many of them seem to agree with Adam Smith, the man who first articulated the concept of free market capitalism, when he wrote that governments should provide some things to all its citizens — public works like roads being one of them.

Back in Brazil, we asked a contractor in charge of work on the BR 101 near the port of Sepetiba about all of this. He told us that even if the poor can’t afford to pay tolls, they would still benefit. The poor, he said, don’t even own cars, so for them, the issue of tolls was moot.  However, he said they do take buses and that bus accidents are a big problem in Brazil.  So, he said, anything that makes the roads safer will also help the poor.

After we finished our interview, we hopped into our car and drove off. About five miles up the road we saw a bus overturned, lying in a ditch on the side of a road. The passengers had already been evacuated and the bus didn’t appear to be heavily damaged, but it served as an eerie reminder of the contractor’s words.

- Bryan Myers

Correspondent Edie Magnus and producer Bryan Myers travel to two neighborhoods — La Boca and Palermo — to sample Argentinians’ thoughts on media, infrastructure, healthcare and justice systems in their country and in America.

Singapore was the first country in the world to implement Electronic Road Pricing (ERP), an electronic toll collection system which aims to reduce traffic — and indeed, less than 30 percent of Singaporeans now own cars.

Other cities have attempted similar measures to reduce congestion. This year, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s plan to charge traffic fees in peak hours was struck down.

Despite Singapore’s successes, as producers Mary Lockhart and Ara Ayer and correspondent Daljit Dhaliwal report, the automatic fees take a toll on Singapore’s commuters. Below, read blogger perceptions of ERP and Singapore’s infrastructure.

This piece was part of the Blueprint America project on infrastructure.

Despite the costs, “Thë bLög accördïиg to jëиz” praises the speed of ERP compared to stopping at tollbooths in other countries.

Singaporean blogger “Glynsen Wong” refutes government justifications of the ERP, describing his frustrating commute.

The “Cruising to Cambodia” blog visits Singapore and praises its subway system as well as its roads and buildings.

Another visitor, blogger “Valliappa Lakshmanan,” claims that beneath the exterior beauty of Singapore’s buildings, lackluster building codes prove that it is still a third-world country.

Finally, the “Life in Dubai” blog compares the infrastructure of Dubai and Singapore, praising and posting images of Singapore’s restored buildings.

Though Singapore tore down many buildings in a rush to modernize, it embarked on a five-year restoration program in the 1990s.

Brazilian workers pave a road.

Bryan Myers reported with Megan Thompson from Brazil on an upcoming story on roads and infrastructure.

Read Bryan’s first blog post from the field: Truckin’ through Brazil.

According to Pedro Bastos, an HSBC investment officer based in Brazil, “We need to invest in highways, rail networks, and airports. We need to improve our infrastructure to take our harvests to ports or processing centers. And frankly, we didn’t invest when we needed to.”

Many truckers couldn’t agree more. One trucker we spoke with has been driving along the same shoddy road for 34 years. He delivers eucalyptus wood from Brazil’s central coast to brick kilns near Rio de Janeiro. He said it was about time the government did something, and told us he’s looking forward to the day his trip goes a little smoother and a little faster.

However, we did meet one trucker who said he thought the government was “lying,” saying that officials have a long history of announcing ambitious plans, only for them to result in nothing. He’ll believe it when he sees it, he said.

One of the roads high on the government’s priority list for improvement is the BR 101. The BR 101 is a two-lane road that leads into the important port of Sepetiba, just south of Rio de Janeiro. As it is, the road has trouble handling all the trucks trying to get into the port. The sight of trucks lined up idling alongside the road is common. The 101 is now being widened to four lanes and appears to be close to completion.

Eventually, the government hopes to connect the 101 with another road on the opposite side of Rio de Janeiro, the BR 493. The 493 is also a narrow two-lane, full of bumps and swales, and it too is slated for improvement.

What is the goal of connecting the 101 and 493? To eventually form a bypass around Rio de Janeiro, solving another problem — that of trucks having to pass through the city.

Some of the $250 billion dollars President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva wants to spend on Brazil’s infrastructure will come from public coffers. But the rest is expected to come from private investment. This effort to enlist private companies has some wondering if Brazil’s poorer citizens will literally be relegated to the slow lane.

- Bryan Myers

Trucks along BR 493 near Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Ask Americans what come to mind when they hear the words “road trip,” and they are likely to mention things like “adventure” and “freedom.”

Mention these words to a Brazilian, and you’re more likely to hear things like “ordeal” and “frustration.”  Simply put, driving long distances in Brazil can be a trying experience.

Along with several reporters from the Worldfocus team, I spent several days traveling Brazil’s highways, talking with motorists and truckers.

Although Brazil is almost the size of the United States, it doesn’t have nearly as many major highways. Apart from areas around São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, most roads labeled as “highways” are actually two-lane roads. Many of them are in poor shape.  Adding to Brazil’s highway headaches are the large number of 18-wheelers on the road—in Brazil, most goods are shipped by truck.

But if Brazil’s president has his way, that’s all about to change. Last year, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva announced the most ambitious plan to overhaul the nation’s infrastructure in Brazilian history. Lula’s plan calls for spending over $250 billion on infrastructure projects by the year 2010 — $17 billion of that will go toward fixing roads.

Lula’s plan couldn’t come at a more crucial time. Along with China and India, Brazil is one of the world’s hottest economies. Much of its newfound wealth is the result of exporting commodities like iron ore, coffee and soybeans. In turn, a newly prosperous middle class is hungry for imports of consumer goods. Timely shipments are essential to keeping the wheels of commerce turning.

- Bryan Myers

Read Bryan’s second blog post from the field: Brazil plans to improve highways.