Mengzhou 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 Mengzhou plotted against Henan and China. While Henan and China both followed a zig-zag trend with an overall increase, Mengzhou's new street additions followed a zig-zag trend with an overall increase. Most recently, Mengzhou's incremental SNDi rose from 1.73 to 1.82 between 1991-2005 and 2006-2020. In terms of the aggregate network, Mengzhou ranked 21st out of 129 cities in Henan and 132nd 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?

• Orani, Philippines
• Hailakandi, India
• Birni N'Konni, Niger
• Chomu, India
• Foggia, Italy
• Zhijiang, China

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