Shulan 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 Shulan plotted against Jilin and China. The SNDi of new construction in Shulan peaked in 1976-1990, compared to Jilin which peaked in 1976-1990 and China which followed a zig-zag trend with an overall increase. Most recently, Shulan's incremental SNDi fell from 5.81 to 4.96 between 1991-2005 and 2006-2020. In terms of the aggregate network, Shulan ranked 47th out of 47 cities in Jilin and 1725th 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?

• Changshou, China
• Shahganj, India
• Charikar, Afghanistan
• Lingyuan, China
• Lalgola, India
• Magura, Bangladesh

In new street additions, Shulan built increasingly disconnected streets from 1975 through 1976-1990, then improved, while Changshou built increasingly connected streets over time and Lingyuan built increasingly disconnected streets from 1975 through 1991-2005, then improved. For the full network, Shulan grew more disconnected from 1975 through 1991-2005, then improved, while Changshou became progressively more connected and Lingyuan became progressively more disconnected. Shulan and Changshou have been growing further apart in their street-network character since 1975.