People now come to Baburail Canal to walk, sit, exercise or spend time with their children. It has become part of everyday life in Narayanganj. A little over a decade ago, the same stretch was associated with accumulated waste, stagnant water and encroachment. But, the transformation has now earned two international honours for architects Md Ishtiaque Zahir and Iqbal Habib of VITTI Sthapati Brindo Ltd.
The project won the Foreign Countries’ Architect of the Year Award at the 35th JK Architect of the Year Awards. It was also named Regional Winner of the CAA Social Impact Award 2026, organised by the Commonwealth Association of Architects.
The canal has a longer history than the park. Narayanganj grew as a river port, and boats once travelled through Baburail carrying jute and rice between the Dhaleshwari and Shitalakshya rivers. As waste accumulated and its edges were occupied, the channel narrowed and the water stopped moving. The canal remained physically present but gradually disappeared from the city’s daily life.
For the VITTI team, the first challenge was not deciding what to build. It was finding a way to recover the canal while working with the people already living around it. Residents, user groups and public agencies were brought into the process, supported by social and environmental assessments. According to the project team, most encroachments were relocated voluntarily. The canal edge was reclaimed with no forced eviction.
That process shaped the design that followed. The restored 405-metre stretch was opened as a public landscape instead of being treated solely as a drainage channel. Ghats and floating decks bring people close to the water. Shaded walkways and permeable paths connect areas for play, sport, skating and exercise. Seating and activity zones accommodate children, women and senior citizens.
Former dumping areas were covered and reshaped into low earth mounds, with a boat club, indoor pool and gym placed within them. The intervention carries a trace of what the site had been, turning damaged ground into a place the city can use again.
Hijol, Jarul and other native species were planted along the canal, together with aquatic vegetation to help stabilise its banks. Local residents and schoolchildren joined tree-planting activities. The returning shade, birds and insects are small but visible signs of ecological recovery. Simple control systems help maintain the movement of water through the restored section.
The nearby Fine Arts Institute now extends activities into the park. Families gather, children play, and festivals such as Pahela Baishakh and Pahela Falgun bring people back to the water’s edge. A place once avoided has become somewhere people choose to stay.
The park receives more than 1,000 visitors on an average day, according to figures supplied by VITTI. The firm also reports a 60 per cent reduction in surrounding waterlogging and a 15 to 20 per cent rise in nearby land values. These figures have not been independently assessed by Prothom Alo.
For Bangladesh, Baburail is important beyond these numbers. Many cities are losing canals and wetlands while also struggling with waterlogging and a shortage of accessible public spaces. These are often addressed as separate problems. Baburail connects them within one intervention: restoring water flow, repairing the ecology and creating a place that people can use every day.
The project also offers a different approach to recovering occupied waterways. Its experience suggests that consultation and voluntary relocation can become part of urban regeneration, reducing the social conflict that often accompanies such projects. It is not a formula that can simply be copied, but it provides a reference for local governments facing similar conditions.
The two awards therefore recognise more than the physical transformation of a canal. They bring international attention to a form of Bangladeshi architecture shaped through public negotiation, ecological repair and continued civic care.
For Zahir, Habib and their team, the recognition follows years of work on a place that had almost disappeared from public memory. For Narayanganj, the more lasting achievement may be simpler: the city has its canal, and a part of its everyday life, back.