Yunxiao 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 Yunxiao plotted against Fujian and China. The SNDi of new construction in Yunxiao was at its lowest in 1991-2005, compared to Fujian which peaked in 1976-1990 and China which followed a zig-zag trend with an overall increase. Most recently, Yunxiao's incremental SNDi rose from 1.79 to 2.29 between 1991-2005 and 2006-2020. In terms of the aggregate network, Yunxiao ranked 5th out of 75 cities in Fujian and 253rd out of 1843 in China as of 2020.

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

What about similarly populated cities?

• Kapurthala, India
• Yunmeng, China
• Thatta, Pakistan
• Mianxian, China
• Nakhchivan, Azerbaijan
• Kadi, India

In new street additions, Yunxiao built increasingly connected streets from 1975 through 1991-2005, then shifted to more disconnected patterns, while Kapurthala fluctuated in its street-construction patterns and Mianxian built increasingly connected streets from 1975 through 1976-1990, then shifted to more disconnected patterns. For the full network, Yunxiao and Mianxian both became more connected from 1975 through 1991-2005, then grew more sprawly from 1991-2005 onwards, while Kapurthala became progressively more disconnected. Yunxiao and Kapurthala have been growing further apart in their street-network character since 1975.