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ZIP Code Tabulation Area

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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Orlady (talk | contribs) at 19:36, 16 August 2008 (→External links: remove from subdivisions of the US category -- not really appropriate for a statistical unit with no other real meaning). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

ZIP Code Tabulation Areas (ZCTAs) are a new statistical entity developed by the United States Census Bureau for tabulating summary statistics from Census 2000. This new entity was developed to overcome the difficulties in precisely defining the land area covered by each ZIP code. Defining the extent of an area is necessary in order to accurately tabulate census data for that area.

ZCTAs are generalized area representations of United States Postal Service (USPS) ZIP code service areas. Because individual USPS ZIP codes can cross state, place, county, census tract, census block group and census block boundaries, there is no correlation between ZIP codes and Census Bureau geography.[1] Each ZCTA is constructed by aggregating the Census 2000 blocks whose addresses use a given ZIP code. In assembling census statistical units to create ZCTAs, the Census Bureau took the ZIP code used by the majority of addresses in each census unit. As a result, some addresses end up with a ZCTA code that is different from their ZIP code.

See also

References

  1. ^ ZIP Code Information, U.S. Census Bureau
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