Louisville in context: Street-network sprawl trends

Louisville in context

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

The chart above shows SNDi trends for new street additions (left panel) and the entire network (right panel), with Louisville plotted against Kentucky and United States. The SNDi of new construction in Louisville rose steadily, compared to Kentucky which rose steadily and United States which peaked in 1991-2005. Most recently, Louisville's incremental SNDi rose from 5.48 to 5.68 between 1991-2005 and 2006-2020. In terms of the aggregate network, Louisville ranked 1st out of 3 cities in Kentucky and 231st out of 333 in United States as of 2020.

New Street Additions (2006–2020)

SNDi value
5.68
Rank in United States
289th of 333
Rank in Kentucky
2nd of 3

Entire Network (Aggregate)

SNDi value
3.74
Rank in United States
231st of 333
Rank in Kentucky
1st of 3

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

What about similarly populated cities?

2.73.64.55.4<19751976–19901991–20052006–2020SNDi of street additions
2.73.64.55.4<19751976–19901991–20052006–2020SNDi of entire street network
LouisvilleYangquanKashgar

In new street additions, Louisville built increasingly disconnected streets over time, while Yangquan built increasingly connected streets from 1975 through 1991-2005, then shifted to more disconnected patterns and Kashgar fluctuated in its street-construction patterns. For the full network, Louisville and Kashgar both became progressively more disconnected, while Yangquan became more connected from 1975 through 1991-2005, then grew more sprawly from 1991-2005 onwards. Louisville and Yangquan have been converging in their street-network character since 1975.