Regional analysis in the United States is limited by the alphabetic FIPS codes which were assigned in the 1960’s. The base codes assigned alphabetically for states, then alphabetically for counties and comparable geographies within states, made it simple to lookup individual state or county data in a list. Some regional aggregation was done in the establishment of Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSA), which were separately coded. Many of these regions matched the geography of early Metropolitan Councils of Government. The relationship definitions which defined such MSAs by workforce commuting, led to their widening over time to more jurisdictions, as well as necessitating combinations of MSAs for market analysis. Since the geographic base changed over time, there was little opportunity for long term analysis of change on standard geography. Totals used obscured differences within the underlying territory. There was no comparable national system to aggregate non-metropolitan counties into standard regions, although most states established some form of multi-county regional councils. Some, like Virginia, used sub-state districts for data aggregation and use by other State agencies, allowing the region number to act like a FIPS code. In the 1990’s, commerce, industry and even workforce commuting expanded along Interstate and Primary routes, showing connections between MSAs and a broad range of non-metropolitan counties, often in adjoining states. To understand these relationships, there was clear need for multi-regional analysis, but no data sets supported this. The author began work in 1998 to promote the development of such a system, submitting a comment to the U.S. Census Bureau February 12, 1999 relative to: Alternative Approaches to Defining Metropolitan and Nonmetropolitan Areas. Continued work on the issue and a review of other national and international systems led to the conclusion that a global geo-code system was needed, since existing formats had tended to be based on an alphabetic approach. Given the multiplicity of regional alignments, multi-national, multi-state, a global geo-code system appeared appropriate. The purpose of this paper is to present the prototype design for the purpose of further consideration by the user communities. The system is based on a geocode scheme set up for earth that focuses on established political boundaries as a basis for regional grouping of nations, states and localities. It is decimal system based to take advantage of the sort criteria for numbers in computers. It utilized the Sector Group and Region codes of the United Nations and ISO. The basic geocodes are: 0000 Earth 0900 Arctic Ocean 1000 Europe 2000 Africa 3000 Atlantic Ocean 4000 Antarctica 5000 Americas 6000 Pacific Ocean 7000 Oceana 8000 Asia 9000 Indian Ocean

1. Global Region-builder Geo-Code Prototype ©
by
Thomas J. Christoffel, AICP, MeRSA
For
RSA Conference May 25, 2010 - Pécs, Hungary
RSAI/NARSC Conference November 13, 2010 – Denver, Colorado
AAG Conference April 14, 2011 - Seattle, Washington
Regional analysis in the United States is limited by the alphabetic FIPS codes which were
assigned in the 1960’s. The base codes assigned alphabetically for states, then alphabetically for
counties and comparable geographies within states, made it simple to lookup individual state or
county data in a list. Some regional aggregation was done in the establishment of Metropolitan
Statistical Areas (MSA), which were separately coded. Many of these regions matched the
geography of early Metropolitan Councils of Government. The relationship definitions which
defined such MSAs by workforce commuting, led to their widening over time to more
jurisdictions, as well as necessitating combinations of MSAs for market analysis. Since the
geographic base changed over time, there was little opportunity for long term analysis of change
on standard geography. Totals used obscured differences within the underlying territory. There
was no comparable national system to aggregate non-metropolitan counties into standard
regions, although most states established some form of multi-county regional councils. Some,
like Virginia, used sub-state districts for data aggregation and use by other State agencies,
allowing the region number to act like a FIPS code.
In the 1990’s, commerce, industry and even workforce commuting expanded along Interstate and
Primary routes, showing connections between MSAs and a broad range of non-metropolitan
counties, often in adjoining states. To understand these relationships, there was clear need for
multi-regional analysis, but no data sets supported this. The author began work in 1998 to
promote the development of such a system, submitting a comment to the U.S. Census Bureau
February 12, 1999 relative to: Alternative Approaches to Defining Metropolitan and
Nonmetropolitan Areas.
Continued work on the issue and a review of other national and international systems led to the
conclusion that a global geo-code system was needed, since existing formats had tended to be
based on an alphabetic approach. Given the multiplicity of regional alignments, multi-national,
multi-state, a global geo-code system appeared appropriate. The purpose of this paper is to
present the prototype design for the purpose of further consideration by the user communities.
The system is based on a geocode scheme set up for earth that focuses on established political
boundaries as a basis for regional grouping of nations, states and localities. It is decimal system
based to take advantage of the sort criteria for numbers in computers. It utilized the Sector Group
and Region codes of the United Nations and ISO.
© Small World Geocode April 4, 2003
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2. The basic geocodes are:
0000 Earth
0900 Arctic Ocean
1000 Europe
2000 Africa
3000 Atlantic Ocean
4000 Antarctica
5000 Americas
6000 Pacific Ocean
7000 Oceana
8000 Asia
9000 Indian Ocean
Map source: http://www.clker.com/clipart-13513.html
The codes were assigned beginning at the north pole as the zero point. The directional path used
to circumnavigate the world and assign geocode numbers in the order that continents and oceans
were encountered was to move North to South, then East to West (NSEW). To encompass the
earth in ten sections, the most inclusive geographic features were used.
Beginning at the Arctic Ocean, the number 0000 was first assigned. Moving south along the
prime meridian, Europe is encountered first and assigned 1000. Next, moving south is Africa,
assigned 2000. Moving west, the north to south feature is the Atlantic Ocean, assigned 3000 with
Antarctica and the southern pole 4000. Returning to the north pole and moving west, the
Americas run north to south and were assigned 5000. Next west is the Pacific Ocean, assigned
6000, with the term Oceana used for the area inclusive of Australia – New Guinea and related
islands. Again returning north, Asia is the next continent and assigned 8000. Moving south, the
Indian Ocean is assigned 9000 to complete the system.
© Small World Geocode April 4, 2003
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3. There are different systems of accounting for continents. These can be reviewed at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continents The purpose of this system is to cover all geographic
territory of our local planet within a ten base system. From this framework, sub-coding can go to
as fine a level as necessary. The intent of the geocodes is to group political entities based on
relative proximity, not the alphabetical relationship which is the basis of Federal Information
Processing Codes (FIPS).
The gross code system assigns large block of potential codes to oceans which have few political
jurisdictions for which to manage information. When first put to use, this became clear for the
Arctic Ocean. Almost immediately there became a need for an Earth Code, since there were so
many organizations with a global approach. Therefore 0000 was assigned to Earth, with 0900
utilized for the Artic Ocean.
Using the Sector and Region names utilized by the United Nations,
http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm, a global geocode system can be
developed. Country names and relationships were matched to those on the Statoids website
maintained by Gwilliam Law http://www.statoids.com/wab.html
The United States is in the Northern Grouping for the Americas, which contains five country
geographies. Two digit numbers were assigned using the NSEW method as follows:
1 northern grouping 5 1 10 Greenland
1 northern grouping 5 1 20 Canada
1 northern grouping 5 1 30 Saint Pierre and Miquelon
1 northern grouping 5 1 40 United States of America
1 northern grouping 5 1 50 Bermuda
1 northern grouping 5 1 60 United States Minor Outlying Islands
In the case of the U.S.A., the country has a region code of 5140 assigned as follows, Americas –
5; northern grouping – 1; NSEW country code – 40. A two digit country code is provided for
because some areas will have more than ten countries within a grouping.
The complete code prototype can be seen in Appendix A - Global Region-builder Geo-Code
Prototype - Elements of 4-digit Geo-code. A look-up table for codes is in Appendix B -
Alphabetic Listing of Geographies, Relationships, Abbreviation and Numerical Code Systems
Sub-Nation Geo-codes
Once a country code is established, the next task is to develop geo-codes based on the sub-
national political geography. In the U.S. that began with the States. The alphabetic FIPS code do
not enable geographic grouping. The U.S. Census Bureau has defined regions and divisions and
this framework was used to develop NSEW geo-codes. The goal is to use as much of existing
systems as possible.
© Small World Geocode April 4, 2003
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4. Beginning in the Northeast Region with the New England Division, a NSEW path was taken to
assign State code numbers, seeking to maximize the analytical benefit of having relative
geographic relationships be visible in data tables, as well as be available for geographic
relationships. The first document was produced November 28, 2002. States and County datasets
have adequate geographic information system geocoding so that that would analytical
relationships can be mapped. The ultimate goal was to establish state and substate regional data
sets that can be compiled for analysis in a similar way.
North-South
Division 07/04/07 Region/State Abr. State FIPS
Northeast
1. New England Division Region
1 Maine ME 23
New
2 Hampshire NH 33
3 Vermont VT 50
4 Massachusetts MA 25
5 Rhode Island RI 44
6 Connecticut CT 9
© Small World Geocode April 4, 2003
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5. Northeast
2. Middle Atlantic Division Region
7 New York NY 36
8 New Jersey NJ 34
9 Pennsylvania PA 42
3. South Atlantic Division South Region
10 Delaware DE 10
11 Maryland MD 24
District of
12 Columbia DC 11
13 Virginia VA 51
14 West Virginia WV 54
15 North Carolina NC 37
16 South Carolina SC 45
17 Georgia GA 13
18 Florida FL 12
4. East South Central
Division South Region
19 Kentucky KY 21
20 Tennessee TN 47
21 Alabama AL 1
22 Mississippi MS 28
5. West South Central
Division South Region
23 Louisiana LA 22
24 Arkansas AR 5
25 Oklahoma OK 40
26 Texas TX 48
6. East North Central Midwest
Division Region
27 Michigan MI 26
28 Ohio OH 39
29 Indiana IN 18
30 Illinois IL 17
31 Wisconsin WI 55
7. West North Central Midwest
Division Region
32 Minnesota MN 27
33 North Dakota ND 38
34 South Dakota SD 46
35 Iowa IA 19
36 Nebraska NE 31
37 Missouri MO 29
38 Kansas KS 20
8. Mountain Division West Region
39 Montana MT 30
40 Wyoming WY 56
41 Idaho ID 16
42 Nevada NV 32
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6. 43 Utah UT 49
44 Colorado CO 8
45 New Mexico NM 35
46 Arizona AZ 4
9. Pacific Division West Region
47 Alaska AK 2
48 Washington WA 53
49 Oregon OR 41
50 California CA 6
51 Hawaii HI 15
Numbering codes have been developed in prototype for sub-state regions and combinations in
multi-state regions and multi-national regions, as well as multi-state and multinational regions
which have related governance regions. Formats and classification rules for coding regions for
aggregation are in development. Working classifications with regional topic tags can be seen at
http://delicious.com/I.see.regions.work
Complete four-digit codes were developed for all oceans, continents, countries and related
islands are shown in Appendix A. Sub-nation codes can be developed for sub-national political
geographies as appropriate to the political geography of the nation as has been done for the
United States.
How do geo-codes enable region-building for analysis? Examples follow for the Mid-Atlantic
Region where Regional Council geography is the Unit of Analysis.
State Codes are: 5140-08 New Jersey, 5140-09 Pennsylvania, 5140-10 Delaware, 5140-11
Maryland, 5140-12 District of Columbia, 5140-13 Virginia and 5140-14 West Virginia. Counties
and, in the case of Virginia, Cities were geo-coded to existing regional council regions. Where a
multi-jurisdictional region did not exist, a Data Region was created.
© Small World Geocode April 4, 2003
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7. The alignment of data from alphabetic FIPS to aggregation by regions follows for Charles City
County located near Richmond, Virginia. The table below shows the County in its alphabetic
position.
Here the County appears in relationship to the other localities of the Richmond Regional
Planning District Commission sorted using its region number 15.
This enabled creation of the Mid-Atlantic Regional Planning Areas map which was used for the
Mid-Atlantic Regional Planning Roundtables which were first organized in 2005 and are now
maintained by the Regional and Intergovernmental Planning Division of the American Planning
Association. The complete table of sub-nation codes, state and counties aggregated to regions is
set out in Appendix C.
© Small World Geocode April 4, 2003
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8. Mid-Atlantic population growth for the period 2000-2005 is shown by region in the maps below
for Net Population Change and Percent Population Change. Boundaries are shown for the Multi-
State combinations of Sub-State regions in the Mid-Atlantic.
The perspective given by the regions, which, for the most part have regional planning and
development organizations, is one that could not be seen via County or MSA geography.
Compared to the MSA geography, the regional council geography is a basis for local government
coordination of land use planning and regional services.
© Small World Geocode April 4, 2003
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9. This land use analysis compares Dwelling Unit densities by region.
Loss of countryside – viewshed? Region land area less Federal and
State Lands – including Urban Areas
Overall density in 2005 drops when Urban areas pulled out –
with time series one could see better the sprawls as build out occurs.
The purpose of this paper is to: (1) present this effort to researchers and practitioners and (2) to
find people who may be interested in this project for analysis of other multi-jurisdictional
regions.
The geo-codes can be used for compilation of topics using tags for geography and subject as
shown at http://delicious.com/I.see.regions.work and Regional Community Development News
http://regional-communities.blogspot.com/
© Small World Geocode April 4, 2003
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