Urban / Rural Definition

Katherine Nesse over 9 years ago

Can anyone point me to a concise definition of urban and rural in the 2010 Decennial Census? I have read the Federal Register notices but I am looking for something that is more brief. I am specifically interested in how the population is defined at the block group level. For example, if I look up a block group and it has an urban population of 179 and a rural population of 12, is there a page somewhere that will briefly describe how these are determined?

Mara Kaminowitz over 9 years ago

I am shocked that there is nothing about this in the SF1 technical documentation. I found a glossary link off of AFF2 that defined urban and rural as whether or not the area of interest is within an urbanized area. (factfinder2.census.gov/.../american_factfinder_help.htm But I think that gets you back to the dreaded Federal Register. A basic description of Urbanized Areas can be found here: www.census.gov/.../urban-rural.html
Cancel
Up 0 Down

Reply

Cancel
Joe Germuska over 9 years ago

There's a lot of good information about the details of Census geographies in the Geographic Areas Reference Manual (GARM). It feels a little dated: it's from 1994 and the index page to the PDFs describes small changes for 2000 but doesn't specifically say whether 2010 had any changes or none.

GARM index:
www.census.gov/.../garm.html
Ch. 12: Urban & Rural Classifications:
www.census.gov/.../Ch12GARM.pdf
Cancel
Up 0 Down

Reply

Cancel
Joe Germuska over 9 years ago

And if you really want to go deep, here's the Federal Register posting on the final Urban area criteria for the 2010 census www.census.gov/.../fedregv76n164.pdf
Cancel
Up 0 Down

Reply

Cancel
Patty Becker over 9 years ago

There were a lot of changes to the urbanized area delineation process in 2000 and
2010 mostly because of improved precision with GIS. It's very detailed
and block by block based on density. Headache producing.
Cancel
Up 0 Down

Reply

Cancel
Keith Wiley over 9 years ago

As it relates to urbanized areas. I was wondering if it is possible to generate e ACS 2012 one-year estimates for urbanized and non-urbanized poverty in the US. Using the American Factfinder, I tried selecting all urban areas and it appears to not include all urbanized areas? I think Beckley, WV is not included. I was just wondering if I was doing something wrong it might not be possible.
Cancel
Up 0 Down

Reply

Cancel