Yarkand 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 Yarkand plotted against Xinjiang Uygur and China. The SNDi of new construction in Yarkand was at its lowest in 1976-1990, compared to Xinjiang Uygur which followed a zig-zag trend with an overall increase and China which followed a zig-zag trend with an overall increase. Most recently, Yarkand's incremental SNDi rose from 2.79 to 3.3 between 1991-2005 and 2006-2020. In terms of the aggregate network, Yarkand ranked 22nd out of 31 cities in Xinjiang Uygur and 1036th 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?

• Daudnagar, India
• Atrauli, India
• Yambio, South Sudan
• Parauapebas, Brazil
• Almeria, Spain
• Huaiyang, China

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