Matli 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 Matli plotted against Sindh and Pakistan. All three follow the same trend in new construction, suggesting a shared regional pattern of development. Most recently, Matli's incremental SNDi rose from 3.47 to 5.23 between 1991-2005 and 2006-2020. In terms of the aggregate network, Matli ranked 35th out of 50 cities in Sindh and 129th 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?

• Butajira, Ethiopia
• Jaén, Spain
• Cosenza, Italy
• Xinghua, China
• Penrith, Australia
• Ash Shamiya, Iraq

While Butajira and Xinghua both built increasingly disconnected streets over time, Matli fluctuated in its street-construction patterns in new street additions. Looking at the full network, Butajira and Xinghua both became progressively more disconnected, while Matli fluctuated in connectivity. Matli and Xinghua have been growing further apart in their street-network character since 1975.