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Zip code/Zip code tabulation area crosswalk

colehooley
over 5 years ago

Hi all,

Does anyone know if there is a zip code/zip code tabulation area crosswalk (i.e. which zip codes are consolidated into a ZCTA). I know that certain zip codes are omitted from ZCTAs for a number of reasons (e.g. large unpopulated areas of land https://www.census.gov/geo/reference/zctas.html). 

Specifically, I am looking at the ZCTAs for Los Angeles County, California.  I have a list of the zip codes for LA county and pulled up the ZCTAs for California. When I compared the zip codes and ZCTAs, I saw that 68.7% of the zip codes did not have a matching ZCTA. Is there any way to find out if some of the zip codes were combined with a particular ZCTA?

Thanks, in advance.

Cole 

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  • over 5 years ago
    I can tell you a few things. 1. Well, you know, there are NO official borders to ZIP codes. I tried to find some. Not even the post office could really tell me. 2. There are no standard generally agreed on borders. I looked at different websites and got different borders. Sometimes one website had the ZIP code in a completely different area than did another website. But folks already know that. So 3. if you go to the US Census site, you can get borders for ZCTAs. Then you can use some software like ESRI to pull in those US Census ZCTA borders, and a lot of those GIS programs will have their own set of borders for ZIP codes. Pull those up too, and use the software to compare borders and identify where any ZIP codes might be combined into any particular ZCTA. Hope that helps.
  • over 5 years ago in reply to Gene Shackman
    Thanks Gene! I appreciate you confirming the fluidity of zip codes and for pointing out a method to compare the boundaries between a ZCTA and a zip codes, very helpful!
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