relating place names to county names, and vice versa

Date: Tue, 27 Feb 1996 00:14:46 -0800
To: Deane Merrill
From: ngparker@ucsd.edu (Nathan Parker)
Subject: Re: place-county equivalence?
Cc: tiger@census.gov, webmaster@census.gov (webmaster), gey@ucdata.berkeley.edu (fred gey)

At 2:03 PM 2/26/96, Deane Merrill wrote:

Given a place name (not a code), how can one most easily determine (on the Web) the name (not the codes) of the county or counties to which it belongs?

and vice versa:

Here's how I would do it:

Go to the Gazetteer (http://tiger.census.gov/cgi-bin/gazetteer), type in the City, State. Click on STF1A URL, then hit stop. Edit the url Location as follows: change "CMD=TABLES" to "CMD=LIST/LEV=CYPL90" and hit the Enter key (not Submit). You will have a list of counties that intersect your city.

For example, "New York,NY" gives

Bronx County
Kings County
New York County
Queens County
Richmond County

For Cities in a County, use the Gazetteer (eg: "Contra Costa County, CA"), click on STF1A, then hit stop. Change "CMD=TABLES" to "CMD=LIST/LEV=MCD90" and hit the Enter key (not Submit). You'll end up with a list of county subdivisions.

For example, "Contra Costa County,CA" gives

Alameda division
Berkeley division
Fremont division
Hayward division
Livermore-Pleasanton division
Oakland division

Select "Go to level State--County--County Subdivision--Place/Remainder". Then, one at a time, click on each county subdivision and Submit.

For example, Fremont division gives

Fremont city (pt.)
Hayward city (pt.)
Newark city
Union CIty city (pt.)
Remainder of Fremont division

This isn't ideal because you have to do the union of all county-subdivision--place/remainders (lots of clicking). There's probably a better way for this one.

-- Nathan

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