Saint Petersburg in context: Street-network sprawl trends

Saint Petersburg in context

2.73.64.55.46.3<19751976–19901991–20052006–2020SNDi of street additions
2.73.64.55.46.3<19751976–19901991–20052006–2020SNDi of entire street network
Saint PetersburgFlorida (Region)United States (Country)

The chart above shows SNDi trends for new street additions (left panel) and the entire network (right panel), with Saint Petersburg plotted against Florida and United States. The SNDi of new construction in Saint Petersburg peaked in 1976-1990, compared to Florida which rose steadily and United States which peaked in 1991-2005. Most recently, Saint Petersburg's incremental SNDi fell from 5.7 to 5.33 between 1991-2005 and 2006-2020. In terms of the aggregate network, Saint Petersburg ranked 7th out of 27 cities in Florida and 214th out of 333 in United States as of 2020.

New Street Additions (2006–2020)

SNDi value
5.33
Rank in United States
274th of 333
Rank in Florida
15th of 27

Entire Network (Aggregate)

SNDi value
3.59
Rank in United States
214th of 333
Rank in Florida
7th of 27

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

What about similarly populated cities?

123456<19751976–19901991–20052006–2020SNDi of street additions
123456<19751976–19901991–20052006–2020SNDi of entire street network
Saint PetersburgQueretaroTrujillo

While Querétaro and Trujillo both fluctuated in its street-construction patterns, Saint Petersburg built increasingly disconnected streets from 1975 through 1976-1990, then improved in new street additions. For the full street network, though, all three cities follow the same trend. Notably, Saint Petersburg had a more sprawly network than Querétaro in 1975 but the two have since reversed their relative ranking.