South Bend in context: Street-network sprawl trends

South Bend in context

2345<19751976–19901991–20052006–2020SNDi of street additions
2345<19751976–19901991–20052006–2020SNDi of entire street network
South BendIndiana (Region)United States (Country)

The chart above shows SNDi trends for new street additions (left panel) and the entire network (right panel), with South Bend plotted against Indiana and United States. The SNDi of new construction in South Bend rose steadily, compared to Indiana which peaked in 1991-2005 and United States which peaked in 1991-2005. Most recently, South Bend's incremental SNDi rose from 2.74 to 2.89 between 1991-2005 and 2006-2020. In terms of the aggregate network, South Bend ranked 1st out of 7 cities in Indiana and 14th out of 333 in United States as of 2020.

New Street Additions (2006–2020)

SNDi value
2.89
Rank in United States
39th of 333
Rank in Indiana
1st of 7

Entire Network (Aggregate)

SNDi value
1.74
Rank in United States
14th of 333
Rank in Indiana
1st of 7

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

What about similarly populated cities?

246810<19751976–19901991–20052006–2020SNDi of street additions
246810<19751976–19901991–20052006–2020SNDi of entire street network
South BendGudalurPasirukem

South Bend, Gudalur, and Pasirukem all built increasingly disconnected streets over time in new street construction. The same pattern holds for the full street network. South Bend and Gudalur have been growing further apart in their street-network character since 1975.