San Rafael in context: Street-network sprawl trends
San Rafael in context
The chart above shows SNDi trends for new street additions (left panel) and the entire network (right panel), with San Rafael plotted against California and United States. The SNDi of new construction in San Rafael followed a zig-zag trend with an overall increase, compared to California which peaked in 1976-1990 and United States which peaked in 1991-2005. Most recently, San Rafael's incremental SNDi rose from 6.69 to 7.3 between 1991-2005 and 2006-2020. In terms of the aggregate network, San Rafael ranked 58th out of 60 cities in California and 306th out of 333 in United States as of 2020.
New Street Additions (2006–2020)
- SNDi value
- 7.3
- Rank in United States
- 323rd of 333
- Rank in California
- 60th of 60
Entire Network (Aggregate)
- SNDi value
- 5.08
- Rank in United States
- 306th of 333
- Rank in California
- 58th of 60
Rankings go from most connected to most disconnected — rank 1 is the most connected.
What about similarly populated cities?
In new street additions, San Rafael fluctuated in its street-construction patterns, while Rybnik built increasingly disconnected streets over time and Chania built increasingly connected streets from 1975 through 1991-2005, then shifted to more disconnected patterns. For the full network, San Rafael and Rybnik both became progressively more disconnected, while Chania became more connected from 1975 through 1991-2005, then grew more sprawly from 1991-2005 onwards. Notably, San Rafael had a more connected network than Chania in 1975 but the two have since reversed their relative ranking.