ZIP Code Tabulation Area

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. [ [http://www.census.gov/geo/www/tiger/tigermap.html#ZIP ZIP Code Information] , U.S. Census Bureau] 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

*Census-designated place

References

External links

* [http://www.census.gov/geo/ZCTA/zcta.html United States Census Bureau ZIP Code Tabulation Areas (ZCTAs)]