Wichita in context: Street-network sprawl trends

Wichita in context

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

The chart above shows SNDi trends for new street additions (left panel) and the entire network (right panel), with Wichita plotted against Kansas and United States. The SNDi of new construction in Wichita rose steadily, compared to Kansas which rose steadily and United States which peaked in 1991-2005. Most recently, Wichita's incremental SNDi rose from 3.55 to 3.71 between 1991-2005 and 2006-2020. In terms of the aggregate network, Wichita ranked 1st out of 3 cities in Kansas and 47th out of 333 in United States as of 2020.

New Street Additions (2006–2020)

SNDi value
3.71
Rank in United States
107th of 333
Rank in Kansas
1st of 3

Entire Network (Aggregate)

SNDi value
2.1
Rank in United States
47th of 333
Rank in Kansas
1st of 3

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

What about similarly populated cities?

1.82.433.6<19751976–19901991–20052006–2020SNDi of street additions
1.82.433.6<19751976–19901991–20052006–2020SNDi of entire street network
WichitaRabwahLincoln

In new street additions, Wichita and Lincoln both built increasingly disconnected streets over time, while Rabwah built increasingly disconnected streets from 1975 through 1991-2005, then improved. For the full street network, though, all three cities follow the same trend. Notably, Wichita had a more sprawly network than Lincoln in 1975 but the two have since reversed their relative ranking.