Ardabil 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 Ardabil plotted against Ardebil and Iran. The SNDi of new construction in Ardabil was at its lowest in 1976-1990, compared to Ardebil which followed a zig-zag trend with an overall decrease and Iran which rose steadily. Most recently, Ardabil's incremental SNDi rose from 2.25 to 2.32 between 1991-2005 and 2006-2020. In terms of the aggregate network, Ardabil ranked 1st out of 4 cities in Ardebil and 32nd out of 169 in Iran as of 2020.

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

What about similarly populated cities?

• Luena, Angola
• Seremban, Malaysia
• Ife, Nigeria
• Huangyan District, China
• Haicheng, China
• Navsari, India

In new street additions, Ardabil built increasingly connected streets from 1975 through 1976-1990, then shifted to more disconnected patterns, while Luena built increasingly disconnected streets from 1975 through 1991-2005, then improved and Huangyan District fluctuated in its street-construction patterns. For the full network, Ardabil became progressively more connected, while Luena grew more disconnected from 1975 through 1991-2005, then improved and Huangyan District fluctuated in connectivity. Notably, Ardabil had a more sprawly network than Huangyan District in 1975 but the two have since reversed their relative ranking.