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The city of Sana'a is experiencing important physical and social changes with the emergence of a network of secondary urban centers. These secondary urban centers seem to successfully attract and concentrate new and old types of activities. One of the major consequences of this recent socio-economic, juridical and land use context is the appearance of new social networks. This multi-polar system becomes a key component of the Yemeni Capital City development, defining new urban development patterns in the outskirts of Sana'a. The purpose of this article is to describe and analyze this original urban development process, which highlights complex interactions between various actors. It results in a new meaning of the Yemeni urban patterns by redefining concepts such as 'being urban' and land tenure within this multi-polar metropolitan area that Sana'a has become.