Xinlong 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 Xinlong plotted against Guangdong and China. The SNDi of new construction in Xinlong was at its lowest in 1976-1990, compared to Guangdong which followed a zig-zag trend with an overall increase and China which followed a zig-zag trend with an overall increase. Most recently, Xinlong's incremental SNDi rose from 2.8 to 4.05 between 1991-2005 and 2006-2020. In terms of the aggregate network, Xinlong ranked 50th out of 133 cities in Guangdong and 931st 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?

• Rampurhat, India
• Temirtau, Kazakhstan
• Bandipora, Jammu and Kashmir
• Biaora, India
• Fort-de-France, Martinique
• Lalsot, India

In new street additions, Xinlong built increasingly connected streets from 1975 through 1976-1990, then shifted to more disconnected patterns, while Rampurhat built increasingly disconnected streets over time and Biaora built increasingly disconnected streets from 1975 through 1991-2005, then improved. Looking at the full network, Rampurhat and Biaora both became progressively more disconnected, while Xinlong became more connected from 1975 through 1976-1990, then grew more sprawly from 1976-1990 onwards. Xinlong and Biaora have been growing further apart in their street-network character since 1975.