Bulawayo in context: Street-network sprawl trends

Bulawayo in context

2.433.64.2<19751976–19901991–20052006–2020SNDi of street additions
2.433.64.2<19751976–19901991–20052006–2020SNDi of entire street network
BulawayoZimbabwe (Country)

The chart above shows SNDi trends for new street additions (left panel) and the entire network (right panel), with Bulawayo plotted against Zimbabwe. The SNDi of new construction in Bulawayo peaked in 1991-2005, while Zimbabwe rose steadily. Most recently, Bulawayo's incremental SNDi fell from 2.71 to 2.45 between 1991-2005 and 2006-2020. In terms of the aggregate network, Bulawayo ranked 3rd out of 14 in Zimbabwe as of 2020.

New Street Additions (2006–2020)

SNDi value
2.45
Rank in Zimbabwe
3rd of 14

Entire Network (Aggregate)

SNDi value
2.39
Rank in Zimbabwe
3rd of 14

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

What about similarly populated cities?

2.43.244.8<19751976–19901991–20052006–2020SNDi of street additions
2.43.244.8<19751976–19901991–20052006–2020SNDi of entire street network
BulawayoFuxinPort Louis

In new street additions, Bulawayo built increasingly disconnected streets from 1975 through 1991-2005, then improved, while Fuxin built increasingly disconnected streets over time and Port Louis built increasingly disconnected streets from 1975 through 1976-1990, then improved. For the full street network, though, all three cities follow the same trend. Bulawayo and Fuxin have been growing further apart in their street-network character since 1975.