Samarbagh 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 Samarbagh plotted against Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and Pakistan. The SNDi of new construction in Samarbagh rose steadily, compared to Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa which followed a zig-zag trend with an overall increase and Pakistan which followed a zig-zag trend with an overall increase. Most recently, Samarbagh's incremental SNDi rose from 4.5 to 6.58 between 1991-2005 and 2006-2020. In terms of the aggregate network, Samarbagh ranked 41st out of 67 cities in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and 253rd out of 292 in Pakistan as of 2020.

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

What about similarly populated cities?

• Tilhar, India
• Pitești, Romania
• North Lakhimpur, India
• Tokat, Turkey
• Medea, Algeria
• Chauri Chaura, India

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