TITLE:
Mapping Intra-Urban Mobility in the City of Thies, Senegal
AUTHORS:
Alphousseyni Ndonky, Charles Diedhiou, Ababacar Fall, Ibrahima Ndiaye
KEYWORDS:
Intra-Urban Mobility, Polarization, Attractiveness, Dominant Flow, Dominant Center, Thies
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Applied Sciences,
Vol.16 No.10,
October
20,
2026
ABSTRACT: Population growth and the fulgurant urban sprawl of Thies are increasing mobility needs. Intra-urban mobility is important because it allows city dwellers to access the wide range of facilities, services, and jobs available throughout the city. Studying it offers the opportunity to highlight segregation processes, the relationship between populations and the city, and to reveal the level of socio-spatial cohesion. However, current information on this issue in Thies is scarce, if not nonexistent. Our main objective is to map intra-urban travel flows within the city. The data comes from the National Agency for Statistics and Demography (ANSD) and from a survey we conducted ourselves. Four methods were used for data analysis: dominant flow analysis, net flow analysis, directional mean analysis, and Pearson correlation. The results revealed a convergence of flows towards the city center, reflecting the attractiveness of this part of the city of Thies. Outlying neighborhoods generate more flows due to their limited infrastructure and services, making them less attractive. Our results also highlighted the preferred directions of mobility flows, a statistically significant relationship between the density of infrastructure and services, the average distance traveled, and the flows of people’s mobility.