Montgomery in context: Street-network sprawl trends

Montgomery in context

3456<19751976–19901991–20052006–2020SNDi of street additions
3456<19751976–19901991–20052006–2020SNDi of entire street network
MontgomeryAlabama (Region)United States (Country)

The chart above shows SNDi trends for new street additions (left panel) and the entire network (right panel), with Montgomery plotted against Alabama and United States. The SNDi of new construction in Montgomery rose steadily, compared to Alabama which rose steadily and United States which peaked in 1991-2005. Most recently, Montgomery's incremental SNDi rose from 4.28 to 5.17 between 1991-2005 and 2006-2020. In terms of the aggregate network, Montgomery ranked 4th out of 4 cities in Alabama and 156th out of 333 in United States as of 2020.

New Street Additions (2006–2020)

SNDi value
5.17
Rank in United States
268th of 333
Rank in Alabama
4th of 4

Entire Network (Aggregate)

SNDi value
3.12
Rank in United States
156th of 333
Rank in Alabama
4th of 4

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

What about similarly populated cities?

12345<19751976–19901991–20052006–2020SNDi of street additions
12345<19751976–19901991–20052006–2020SNDi of entire street network
MontgomeryAdabaAbu Zabad

In new street additions, Montgomery and Adaba both built increasingly disconnected streets over time, while Abu Zabad fluctuated in its street-construction patterns. For the full street network, though, all three cities follow the same trend. Notably, Montgomery had a more sprawly network than Abu Zabad in 1975 but the two have since reversed their relative ranking.