Qingbaijiang 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 Qingbaijiang plotted against Sichuan and China. The SNDi of new construction in Qingbaijiang was at its lowest in 1976-1990, compared to Sichuan which followed a zig-zag trend with an overall increase and China which followed a zig-zag trend with an overall increase. Most recently, Qingbaijiang's incremental SNDi rose from 3.94 to 3.96 between 1991-2005 and 2006-2020. In terms of the aggregate network, Qingbaijiang ranked 68th out of 98 cities in Sichuan and 1515th 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?

• Bihpur, India
• Monywa, Myanmar
• Alaba Kulito, Ethiopia
• Münster, Germany
• Beawar, India
• Ulanhot, China

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