Prototype Global Coding of Political Geographies for Library and Data Management – Wikipedia Example

Papers in Applied Geography, Volume 36: 246-255
PROTOTYPE GLOBAL CODING OF POLITICAL GEOGRAPHIES FOR LIBRARY AND
DATA MANAGEMENT – WIKIPEDIA EXAMPLE
Thomas J. Christoffel (Tom.Christoffel@gmail.com)
Regional Intelligence-Regional Communities, LLC
Front Royal, VA 22630-0031
1. INTRODUCTION
Regional geographic analysis in the United States is constrained by the alphabetic
Federal Information Processing Codes (FIPS) codes which were assigned in the 1960’s. Base
codes were assigned alphabetically for states, then alphabetically for counties and comparable
geographies within states, making it simple to lookup individual state or county data in a list,
but offering no geographic information on proximity. Some regional aggregation was done in
the establishment of Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSA), which was separately coded,
however there is, to this day, nothing comparable for non-metropolitan jurisdictions.
Many of the MSA regions matched the 1960’s geography of metropolitan Councils of
Government (COG). Establishment of systems of regional councils by states was encouraged
in the late 1960’s for the OMB A-95 Intergovernmental Review process and HUD 701
planning funding. The Appalachian Regional Commission and Economic Development
Administration funded substate regional approaches for rural economic development. Regional
councils today are the basis for substate regional planning and implementation, and if used as a
base, can give complete single layer coverage of the U.S. for substate regional analysis.
In the 1990’s, commerce, industry and workforce commuting expanded along
Interstate and primary highway routes, showing connections between MSAs, which expanded
far beyond the early boundaries, and a broad range of non-metropolitan counties in adjoining
states. To understand these relationships, there was a need for multi-state multi-regional
analysis, but no data sets existed to take advantage of state COG/regional council planning
geographies. The author began work in 1998 to promote the development of such a system,
based on 25 years of experience using the Virginia Planning District system for regional
analysis. A recommendation to use substate regional council geography as a means to develop
nationwide regional coverage was submitted 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 geocode system was needed, one that could be used in
conjunction with FIPS codes. This review was facilitated by the work of Gwillim Law (1999),
whose Administrative Divisions of Countries information is maintained online as the Statoids
website, statoids.com. The European Union has a system for regions and regional statistics
managed by Eurostat: NUTS - Nomenclature of territorial units for statistics. Though it
provides single layer regional coverage, it did not appear to be scalable to a global system.
To provide for multi-country and cross-boundary regions at the national, sub-
national, state and substate levels, a global design has been prototyped. Economists Jeffery
Sachs and James K. Galbraith both expressed interest in such a system to the author. Professor
Sachs opened his 2012 address to the American Association of Geographers explaining that,
“economists think counties are arranged alphabetically on the globe, since that is the way the
data appears.” The geocodes arrange country information geographically on a spreadsheet.
This paper presents the prototype global geocode design applied to the U.S. at the
State level, with substate level examples from Delaware, Maryland, Virginia and the District of
Columbia. The objective is to gain further consideration by potential user communities.

247
2. GLOBAL CODING OF POLITICAL GEOGRAPHIES – GEOCODE METHOD
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 a
decimal system designed to take advantage of the sort criteria for numbers in computers. It
utilizes the geographical regions of the United Nations found at http://goo.gl/eMGsjb. Country
codes of international standard ISO 3166-1 are at http://statoids.com/wab.html. The current
copy of geocodes, which lists comparative UN and ISO codes, is at http://goo.gl/DVZsqS.
Besides being used for data aggregation and analysis, the geocode system also
supports library management. Initial development of this approach by the author was for the
very practical management of information at the now Northern Shenandoah Valley Regional
Commission which served the geography of Virginia Planning District 7. A library
classification system for Planning Districts modeled after the Dewey Decimal system did not
work well, so a geographical approach was taken beginning in the late 1970s which also served
for project accounting. Scaling up that experience contributed to this system design.
To illustrate the ability to place relevant information in proximity based on
geography, the example used in this paper is that of arraying Wikipedia information as a virtual
library. The basic global geocodes are set out in Table 1.
TABLE 1
GLOBAL GEOCODES: EARTH, OCEANS, CONTINENTS-WIKIPEDIA LINKS
Geocode Geography Library Organization of Wikipedia Links
0000 Earth http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth
0900 Arctic Ocean http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arctic_Ocean
1000 Europe http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europe
2000 Africa http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Africa
3000 Atlantic Ocean http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantic_Ocean
4000 Antarctica http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antarctica
5000 Americas http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americas
6000 Pacific Ocean http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Ocean
7000 Oceana http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oceania
8000 Asia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asia
9000 Indian Ocean http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Ocean
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. 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, rather than alphabetically,for tabular data.
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, given the issues. There is an undersea geography which may be
usefully coded by the user community and the prototype provides for that.

248
Geographical regions of the UN are used. Northern America has five political
geographies. Two digit numbers were assigned using the NSEW method as shown in Table 2.
The U.S. geocode 5140 is derived as follows: Americas – 5; Northern America – 1; NSEW
country code – 40. Some regions have more than ten countries, so two digits are required.
TABLE 2
GEOCODES NORTHERN AMERICA-WIKIPEDIA LINKS
Americas
Grouping
NSEW
Political
Geography Library Organization of Wikipedia Links
5 1 10 Greenland http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenland
5 1 20 Canada http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada
5 1 30
Saint Pierre &
Miquelon http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Pierre_and_Miquelon
5 1 40 U.S. of America http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_of_America
5 1 50 Bermuda http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bermuda
3. SUBNATIONAL GEOCODING OF POLITICAL GEOGRAPHIES
Once the country code is set, the next step is to develop geocodes for the subnational
political geographies. In the U.S., the States and their counties or county equivalents, are the
major political geographies for governance and census data. States have an alphabetic FIPS
code which rarely results in geographic grouping. See Figure 1.
FIGURE 1
GEOGRAPHIC RELATIONSHIP OF STATES IN FIPS CODES
Alphabetic sort is important for data sets. The goal is not to replace FIPS codes, but to develop
a geocode that produces relative geographic grouping for analysis. The process uses the U.S.
Census Bureau defined regions and divisions as the framework for geocodes. See Figure 2.
Beginning in the Northeast Region with the New England Division, the NSEW
method used for continental codes was taken to assign State geocodes. The results are shown
in Table 3. NSEW in general gives a tabular display that puts geographic neighbors near one
another. Variations of directionality were used for other regions in the prototype in order to
achieve the tabular result.

249
FIGURE 2
CENSUS REGIONS AND DIVISIONS OF THE UNITED STATES
TABLE 3
NSEW GEOCODES FOR STATES AND ANSI-FIPS COMPARISON

250
The four digit geocode serves as a base. Political subdivisions within that geography
are coded to the right of the decimal. Table 4 shows the State geocode addition to the U.S.
code with the Wikipedia links demonstrating the library application. The jump from Texas to
Michigan may seem severe, but it is something an analyst can handle.
TABLE 4
BASE GEOCODES FOR THE UNITED STATES AND ITS STATES
Geocode Nation/State Library Organization of Wikipedia Links
5140.00
United States of
America
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_of_America
5140.01 Maine http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maine
5140.02 New Hampshire http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Hampshire
5140.03 Vermont http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vermont
5140.04 Massachusetts http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts
5140.05 Rhode Island http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhode_Island
5140.06 Connecticut http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connecticut
5140.07 New York http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York
5140.08 New Jersey http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Jersey
5140.09 Pennsylvania http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pennsylvania
5140.10 Delaware http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delaware
5140.11 Maryland http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maryland
5140.12 District of Columbia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/District_of_Columbia
5140.13 Virginia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia
5140.14 West Virginia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Virginia
5140.15 North Carolina http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Carolina
5140.16 South Carolina http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Carolina
5140.17 Georgia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia
5140.18 Florida http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florida
5140.19 Kentucky http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kentucky
5140.20 Tennessee http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tennessee
5140.21 Alabama http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alabama
5140.22 Mississippi http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mississippi
5140.23 Louisiana http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louisiana
5140.24 Arkansas http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arkansas
5140.24 Oklahoma http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oklahoma
5140.26 Texas http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas
5140.27 Michigan http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michigan
5140.28 Ohio http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ohio
5140.29 Indiana http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indiana
5140.30 Illinois http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illinois
5140.31 Wisconsin http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wisconsin
5140.32 Minnesota http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minnesota
5140.33 North Dakota http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Dakota
5140.34 South Dakota http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Dakota

251
5140.35 Iowa http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iowa
5140.36 Nebraska http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nebraska
5140.37 Missouri http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missouri
5140.38 Kansas http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kansas
5140.39 Montana http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montana
5140.40 Wyoming http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wyoming
5140.41 Idaho http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idaho
5140.42 Nevada http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nevada
5140.43 Utah http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utah
5140.44 Colorado http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colorado
5140.45 New Mexico http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Mexico
5140.46 Arizona http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arizona
5140.47 Alaska http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alaska
5140.48 Washington http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington_(state)
5140.49 Oregon http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oregon
5140.50 California http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California
5140.51 Hawaii http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawaii
4. SUBNATIONAL GEOCODING OF POLITICAL GEOGRAPHIES FOR REGIONS
The historic primary substate political region of States is the county or its equivalent.
It is for these areas that Census data is collected and maintained. Four states have independent
cities for which census data is collected. Virginia has 39, while Maryland, Missouri and
Nevada each have one. Though Connecticut, Rhode Island and Massachusetts have eliminated
some or all counties, census data is compiled for historic counties which have no current
governance function. State data is collected on the same geography and is a resource.
As previously noted, though Federal programs have encouraged and funded multi-
jurisdictional regional approaches, the substate district is essentially an administrative tool of
states. Generally there are a variety of agency based multi-jurisdictional substate district
systems used by departments and agencies for program administration. While they may
interface with localities and local officials for planning and programming, there is rarely a
representative organizational structure. The Federal Metropolitan Planning Organization
process is an exception, but it is confined to the defined urbanized areas and is for
transportation planning only. Regional councils are, or can be, multi-issue in their planning.
The prototype uses the state based COG/regional council alignments as the substate
region. Most states have complete systems. Where there is no organized council, a data region
is coded. For Delaware and Hawaii, the county is the substate region. Compared to other
systems of substate regions, the COG/regional councils have the advantage of local government
representation appointed by the member local governments, the responsibility for a variety of
planning processes which include local government planner, and, in many cases, the ability to
implement or promote the implementation of regional programs. Having worked together for
over 40 years in some regions, there is some “regional community” social capital. Staffs work
with communities and their data, in effect cultivating “regional intelligence.” Multi-state
councils enable coordination across state lines, while operating consistent with regional council
requirements of each state. A national, single-layer of substate regions is the base product. If
substate region boundaries are renegotiated, as is underway in Connecticut, the codes can be
changed to match new alignments. Multi-state regions are the sum of substate components.

252
The 1968 Virginia substate planning district design and implementation made in-state
regional analysis easy. The Mid-Atlantic Regional Planning Roundtable, begun in 2005 by the
Northern Shenandoah Valley Regional Commission and the Metropolitan Washington COG
grew to include: Washington, D.C., Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, Delaware,
Pennsylvania and New Jersey. The Mid-Atlantic served as the first use of the substate region
geocodes. “Numbers were assigned to group counties in order to compile for the analysis.
According to Wendi Stine, GIS Analyst, this is the primary innovation relative to this project.
Once the geography is defined, compilation and application of traditional tools can go
forward.” (Christoffel, 2006) Substate geocode examples from the Mid-Atlantic region follow.
Delaware, Maryland, Virginia and the District of Columbia are presented in Table 5 –
Parts 1 and 2 as examples of the current geocode. Subnational geocodes: 5140.10 for
Delaware; 5140.11 for Maryland; 5140.12 for the District of Columbia; and 5140.13 utilize the
next two digits for multi-jurisdictional regions in that State/District. Neither Delaware nor D.C.
have such regions, so those digits remain 00. Maryland has seven substate regions and Virginia
23, which are assigned spaced geocodes. At all levels of the system, there is a conscious effort
to allow numerical space for the potential emergence of new political geographies.
The next two digits assigned are for Counties and Independent Cities. The code
spacing is done relatively within the region, using the NSEW approach in order to produce a
situation where data and information have geographic proximity. This is because the first level
of comparison tends to be: “How are we doing compared to our neighbors?” and based on the
number of jurisdictions. Although Delaware has only three counties, the code improves the
data for the analyst by giving the geographic alignment.
Maryland has seven substate regions. The Suburban Washington Region does not
have a separate organization. Its counties are members of the Washington Metropolitan COG.
In Virginia, the Northern Virginia Regional Commission is the substate region. All of its
members are in the COG, but that COG could not do the Virginia specific functions. The
coding system allows regions and localities to be grouped to the region needed for the issue, be
it a watershed, commuter shed or multi-state corridor.
Table 5 – Part-1 shows the Subnational Geocode in comparison to the State and
County/Independent City ANSI-FIPS code. One gives a sort based on relative geography, the
other, the alphabet. Both are needed for analysis and the geocode, as demonstrated, can also
support library management. Not all relevant information is numerical.
5. ACTION
The purpose of this paper to find others interested in further development of this
method of applied geography to, at a minimum, get single layer coverage of U.S. substate
regions for analytical use. The prototype has been developed under a Creative Commons
license and would benefit from an open system network implementation. The system is
supplemental to FIPS coding and could be used as needed. Current working documents will be
maintained at http://goo.gl/7CoilIE. Given that its value might be confirmed in the future, only
then would the long process for consideration as a standard begin.
6. REFERENCES
Christoffel, T. 2006. Regional Councils as a Geospatial Unit of Analytical Geography - The
Virginia Geospatial Newsletter 4(4): 4-8. Blacksburg, VA.
European Commission. Eurostat. European Statistical System. http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.
eu/portal/page/portal/nuts_nomenclature/history_nuts. Last access: 3 September
2013.
Law, G. 1999. Administrative Subdivisions of Countries: A Comprehensive World Reference,
1900 through 1998. Jefferson, NC: McFarland.
Law, G. 2003. Administrative Divisions of Countries ("Statoids"). Web. http://www.statoids.
Com. Last access: 3 September 2013.

253
TABLE 5 – Part 1
SUBSTATE AND MULTI-STATE GEOCODES FOR REGIONS OF DELAWARE,
MARYLAND, AND THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
Subnational
Geocode
State's
Substate
Region
Identifier
State/Sub-state
Region
County/
Independent
City
State and
County/
Independent
City ANSI-
FIPS Wikipedia/URL
5140.100000 Delaware /Delaware
5140.100010 County 10003 /New_Castle_County,_De
5140.100020 Kent County 10001 /Kent_County,_Delaware
5140.100030 Sussex County 10005 /Sussex_County,_Delawar
5140.110000 Maryland 24000 /Maryland
5140.112010 2 of 7
Suburban Washington
Region
Frederick
County 24021
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki
/Frederick_County,_Maryl
5140.112020 2 of 7
Suburban Washington
Region
Montgomery
County 24031
/Montgomery_County,_M
5140.112030 2 of 7
Suburban Washington
Region
Prince Georges
County 24033
/Prince_George%27s_Cou
5140.112099 2 of 7
Suburban Washington
Region http://www.mwcog.org/
5140.120000 District of Columbia Washington 11001 /Washington,_D.C.
5140.121099
5140.122099
5140.123099
5140.124099
5140.130000 Virginia 51000 /Virginia
5140.132410 8 of 23
Northern Virginia
Regional Commission
Arlington
County 51013
/Arlington_County,_Virgini
5140.132420 8 of 23
Northern Virginia
Regional Commission
City of
Alexandria 51510
/Alexandria,_Virginia
5140.132430 8 of 23
Northern Virginia
Regional Commission Fairfax County 51059
/Fairfax_County,_Virginia
5140.132440 8 of 23
Northern Virginia
Regional Commission
City of Falls
Church 51610
/Falls_Church,_Virginia
5140.132450 8 of 23
Northern Virginia
Regional Commission City of Fairfax 51600
/Fairfax,_Virginia
5140.132460 8 of 23
Northern Virginia
Regional Commission
Loudoun
County 51107
/Loudoun_County,_Virgini
5140.132470 8 of 23
Northern Virginia
Regional Commission
Prince William
County 51153
/Prince_William_County,_
5140.132480 8 of 23
Northern Virginia
Regional Commission
City of
Manassas Park 51685
/Manassas_Park,_Virginia
5140.132490 8 of 23
Northern Virginia
Regional Commission
City of
Manassas 51683
/Manassas,_Virginia
5140.132499 8 of 23
Northern Virginia
Regional Commission
http://www.novaregion.org
/

254
TABLE 5-Part 2
SUBSTATE AND MULTI-STATE GEOCODES FOR REGIONS OF DELAWARE,
MARYLAND, AND THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
Subnational
Geocode
County/
Independent
City Multi-State Region Name Type Wikipedia/URL
5140.100000
5140.100010 County WILMAPCO MPO http://www.wilmapco.org/
5140.100020 Kent County
5140.100030 Sussex County
5140.110000
5140.112010
Frederick
County
Metropolitan Washington
Council of Governments
COG/
MPO
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropolitan
_Washington_Council_of_Governments
5140.112020
Montgomery
County
COG/
MPO
5140.112030
Prince Georges
County
COG/
MPO
5140.112099
COG/
MPO
5140.120000 Washington
5140.121099
Council of Governments COG
5140.122099 Transportation Planning MPO b/
5140.123099 National Capital Region - http://www.capitalregionupdates.gov/
5140.124099
Washington Metropolitan
Area MSA
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington
_Metropolitan_Area
5140.130000
5140.132410
Arlington
County
COG/
MPO
5140.132420
City of
Alexandria
COG/
MPO
5140.132430 Fairfax County
COG/
MPO
5140.132440
City of Falls
Church
COG/
MPO
5140.132450 City of Fairfax
COG/
MPO
5140.132460
Loudoun
County
COG/
MPO
5140.132470
Prince William
County
COG/
MPO
5140.132480
City of
Manassas Park
COG/
MPO
5140.132490
City of
Manassas
COG/
MPO
5140.132499
COG/
MPO

255
United Nations. United Nations Statistics Division. Dept. of Economic and Social Affairs.
http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm. Last access: 3 September
2013.
United States. Bureau of the Census, United States. Dept. of Commerce. Web. http://www.
census.gov/econ/census07/www/geography/regions_and_divisions.html. Last access:
3 September 2013.
Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. 22 July 2004. http://en.
wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page. Last access: 3 September 2013.

Prototype Global Coding of Political Geographies for Library and Data Management – Wikipedia Example

Recommandé

Recommandé

Contenu connexe

En vedette

En vedette (20)

Similaire à Prototype Global Coding of Political Geographies for Library and Data Management – Wikipedia Example

Similaire à Prototype Global Coding of Political Geographies for Library and Data Management – Wikipedia Example (20)

Plus de Tom Christoffel

Plus de Tom Christoffel (16)

Dernier

Dernier (20)

Prototype Global Coding of Political Geographies for Library and Data Management – Wikipedia Example