Evaluating Roads Network Connectivity for Two Municipalities in Baghdad-Iraq

Abstract

The road network serves as a hub for opportunities in production and consumption, resource extraction, and social cohabitation. In turn, this promotes a higher standard of living and the expansion of cities. This research explores the road network's spatial connectedness and its effects on travel and urban form in the Al-Kadhimiya and Al-Adhamiya municipalities. Satellite images and paper maps have been employed to extract information on the existing road network, including their kinds, conditions, density, and lengths. The spatial structure of the road network was then generated using the ArcGIS software environment. The road pattern connectivity was evaluated using graph theory indices. The study demands the abstraction and examination of the topological structure by choosing a few factors associated with the connection of the roads. These involved the cyclomatic number, Eta coefficient, Aggregate Transform Score (ATS), Beta, gamma, and Alpha indices. According to the findings, the Al-Adhamiya roads network is more developed, better linked, and has a higher overall connectivity value than the Al-Kadhimiya network. The two study areas, however, have minimal circuitry and high complexity. Due to the modifications and expansion of land use that the municipalities have seen, the research suggests that the transportation network should be developed to reach greater interconnectedness, particularly in locations outside the city center.