Bahawalnagar 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 Bahawalnagar plotted against Punjab and Pakistan. The SNDi of new construction in Bahawalnagar rose steadily, compared to Punjab which followed a zig-zag trend with an overall increase and Pakistan which followed a zig-zag trend with an overall increase. Most recently, Bahawalnagar's incremental SNDi rose from 3.67 to 4.33 between 1991-2005 and 2006-2020. In terms of the aggregate network, Bahawalnagar ranked 29th out of 146 cities in Punjab and 51st 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?

• Jimma, Ethiopia
• Beldanga, India
• Wonju, South Korea
• Meihekou, China
• Porbandar, India
• Sikandarabad, India

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