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AUSTRALIAN DRAINAGE DIVISIONS

Australian Drainage Divisions (ADDs) are an ABS approximation of drainage divisions. Drainage divisions are defined by major landscape features and climatic zones to form broad hydrological regions as represented in the Australian Hydrological Geospatial Fabric (Geofabric) version 1 developed by the Bureau of Meteorology.

More information can be found on the Bureau of Meteorology website: http://www.bom.gov.au/water/geofabric/index.shtml


METHODOLOGY

The boundaries and census statistics produced for ADDs are constructed from Statistical Area Level 1 (SA1) based on the method described in Chapter 1.

ADDs are based on the publicly available Geofabric version of drainage divisions. 15 ADDs are defined to cover the whole of geographic Australia excluding Cocos (Keeling) and Christmas Islands which have been allocated to D91 "Unclassified (Aust.)". ADDs can cross state borders, the best example of this is the Murray-Darling Basin which crosses over 4 States and Territories (S/T).

Unclassified, No Usual Address and Migratory-Offshore-Shipping are represented as non spatial objects in the digital boundaries.


ADD NAMES

ADD names are the same as those allocated by the Bureau of Meteorology.


ADD CODING STRUCTURE

ADDs are sorted by name then allocated a two digit code starting from 01. This is prefixed by a “D” which enables unique identification of ADDs across the country and differentiates them from other ABS codes.

Special purpose codes are included as balancing items. SA1s allocated to these codes are not part of any official drainage division.

• ADD code D94 is reserved for those S/T where people are coded to the No Usual Address SA1s.
• ADD code D97 is reserved for S/T that have Migratory, Off-Shore and Shipping SA1s.