Note: For source and production information, see the What MassGIS Provides section on the main MassGIS Census 2000 Web page.
 

ATTRIBUTES

The polygon attributes (census2000blocks_poly.dbf and census2000blocks_poly_orig.dbf) for the Census 2000 Blocks shapefiles distributed by MassGIS contain the following items:
 

ITEM NAME		TYPE / WIDTH		DESCRIPTION
AREA		N / 20		Area of polygon(s) in square meters.
PERIMETER		N / 20		Perimeter of polygon(s) in meters.
STATE		C / 2		State ID Code (Massachusetts = 25)
COUNTY		C / 3		County code (FIPS-ID without “25”)
TRACT		C / 6		Census 2000 Tract Code
BLOCKGROUP		C / 1		Census 2000 Blockgroup Code
BLOCK		C / 4		Census 2000 Block Code
BLK_ID		C / 20		Unique Block ID value
BG_ID		C / 20		Unique Blockgroup ID value
CT_ID		C / 20		Unique Census Tract ID value
LOGRECNO		C / 7		Common field to join/link to related attribute tables
REPDISTNUM		N / 3		State Representative District Code
SENDISTNUM		N / 2		State Senate District Code
CD108		N / 2		108th U.S. Congressional District Code
TOWN_ID		N / 3		Town ID Code
POP_2000		N / 6		Census 2000 Population Value (from SF1)
DRY_PCT		N / 6		Percentage of non-water area for the block
DRY_ACRES		N / 6		Non-water area, in Acres
DRY_SQMI		N / 6		Non-water area, in Square Miles
DRY_SQKM		N / 6		Non-water area, in Square Kilometers
** - For the most accurate display of population density by Block, normalize POP_2000 by any of the last three items.

The following table, available in dBase format (.dbf), which provides detailed demographics information, may be joined to the Blocks shapefiles on the LOGRECNO item. See the Field Descriptions page for details.

cen2k_b_pop_age_gen.dbf
Lists how many members of each gender fall within incremental age categories. Download (includes field description Excel file)

More tables storing demographics data that may be joined to the Blocks shapefiles will be forthcoming. Iin addition, the REPDISTNUM, SENDISTNUM, and CD108 items may be used to join these tables to the State Senate, State House, and U.S. Congressional (108th) district layers, respectively.

MassGIS updated the two verisons of the Blocks layer in April 2003: a small number of polygons had miscodings in some of the MassGIS-added fields (TOWN_ID, REPDISTNUM, and SENDISTNUM). Additionally, the "DRY" fields were added to these layers.

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• OVERVIEW
• WHAT MASSGIS PROVIDES
• Census 2000 Blocks
• Census 2000 Block Groups
• Census 2000 Tracts
• Census 2000 TIGER Linework
• Census 2000 TIGER Water Bodies
• Census 2000 TIGER Towns
• Environmental Justice Populations
• CONSIDERATIONS WHEN USING TIGER DATA
• OTHER RESOURCES

 

Last Updated 7/31/2003
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