La Calera in context: Street-network sprawl trends

The chart above shows SNDi trends for new street additions (left panel) and the entire network (right panel), with La Calera plotted against Valparaíso and Chile. The SNDi of new construction in La Calera peaked in 1991-2005, compared to Valparaíso which followed a zig-zag trend with an overall increase and Chile which followed a zig-zag trend with an overall increase. Most recently, La Calera's incremental SNDi fell from 4.77 to 4.38 between 1991-2005 and 2006-2020. In terms of the aggregate network, La Calera ranked 4th out of 7 cities in Valparaíso and 29th out of 38 in Chile as of 2020.

Rankings go from most connected to most disconnected — rank 1 is the most connected.

What about similarly populated cities?

• Swakopmund, Namibia
• Hyangsan, North Korea
• Nakhon Phanom, Thailand
• Gutin, Ethiopia
• Sincheon-dong, South Korea
• Ajab Shir, Iran

In new street additions, La Calera built increasingly disconnected streets from 1975 through 1991-2005, then improved, while Swakopmund built increasingly connected streets over time and Gutin built increasingly connected streets from 1975 through 1976-1990, then shifted to more disconnected patterns. For the full network, La Calera became progressively more disconnected, while Swakopmund became progressively more connected and Gutin became more connected from 1975 through 1976-1990, then grew more sprawly from 1976-1990 onwards. Notably, La Calera had a more connected network than Swakopmund in 1975 but the two have since reversed their relative ranking.