Saktipur 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 Saktipur plotted against West Bengal and India. The SNDi of new construction in Saktipur rose steadily, compared to West Bengal which followed a zig-zag trend with an overall increase and India which followed a zig-zag trend with an overall increase. Most recently, Saktipur's incremental SNDi rose from 8.79 to 9.98 between 1991-2005 and 2006-2020. In terms of the aggregate network, Saktipur ranked 127th out of 140 cities in West Bengal and 1810th out of 1868 in India as of 2020.

Rankings go from most connected to most disconnected — rank 1 is the most connected.

What about similarly populated cities?

• Farah, Afghanistan
• Zhangpu, China
• Virudhachalam, India
• Flores, Guatemala
• Kattappana, India
• Kuhdasht, Iran

In new street additions, Saktipur built increasingly disconnected streets over time, while Farah built increasingly connected streets from 1975 through 1991-2005, then shifted to more disconnected patterns and Flores fluctuated in its street-construction patterns. For the full network, Saktipur and Flores both became progressively more disconnected, while Farah became progressively more connected. Saktipur and Farah have been growing further apart in their street-network character since 1975.