<abstract xml:lang="en" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p>This paper discusses, first, the concepts of fractals and power laws in relation to the street patterns of the city of Dundee, East Scotland and, second, the results of the measurement of 6,004 street segments in the city. The trends of the street segments are presented through rose diagrams and show that there are two main street trends in the city: one is parallel with the coast, the other is roughly perpendicular to the coast. It is clear that the coastline largely regulates the street trend, because both the main street trends change along the city so as to be nearly coast-perpendicular and coast-parallel everywhere. The lengths of the street segments follow power laws. When presented on log-log plots, however, the result is not a single straight line but two straight lines. At the break in line slope, the fractal dimension changes from 0.88 to 2.20. The change occurs at the step length of about 100 m, indicating that the short streets belong to a population that is different from that of the longer streets.</p></abstract>

This paper discusses, first, the concepts of fractals and power laws in relation to the street patterns of the city of Dundee, East Scotland and, second, the results of the measurement of 6,004 street segments in the city. The trends of the street segments are presented through rose diagrams and show that there are two main street trends in the city: one is parallel with the coast, the other is roughly perpendicular to the coast. It is clear that the coastline largely regulates the street trend, because both the main street trends change along the city so as to be nearly coast-perpendicular and coast-parallel everywhere. The lengths of the street segments follow power laws. When presented on log-log plots, however, the result is not a single straight line but two straight lines. At the break in line slope, the fractal dimension changes from 0.88 to 2.20. The change occurs at the step length of about 100 m, indicating that the short streets belong to a population that is different from that of the longer streets.

City Shape and the Fractality of Street Patterns

Department of Geography and Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis, University College London, UK

Quaestiones Geographicae

{"article-title":"City Shape and the Fractality of Street Patterns"}

This paper discusses, first, the concepts of fractals and power laws in relation to the street patterns of the city of Dundee, East Scotland and, second, the...

City Shape and the Fractality of Street Patterns

Published Online: Jun 21, 2012

Page range: 29 - 37

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/v10117-012-0016-6

Keywords
fractal, street network, city

This content is open access.

City Shape and the Fractality of Street Patterns

Published Online: Jun 21, 2012

Page range: 29 - 37

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/v10117-012-0016-6

Keywordsfractal, street network, city

This content is open access.

Keywords
fractal, street network, city