1270.0.55.001 - Australian Statistical Geography Standard (ASGS): Volume 1 - Main Structure and Greater Capital City Statistical Areas, July 2016  
ARCHIVED ISSUE Released at 11:30 AM (CANBERRA TIME) 12/07/2016   
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METADATA FOR DIGITAL BOUNDARY FILES

Australian Statistical Geography Standard (ASGS) Volume 1 - Main Structure and Greater Capital City Statistical Areas (cat no. 1270.0.55.001)

Date of Publication/ Date Stamp : 12 July 2016

Presentation Format: Digital boundaries

CUSTODIAN

Custodian: Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS)

DESCRIPTION

Abstract:

The Australian Statistical Geography Standard (ASGS) brings together in one framework all of the regions which the ABS and many others organisations use to collect, release and analyse geographically classified statistics. The ASGS ensures that these statistics are comparable and geospatially integrated and provides users with an coherent set of standard regions so that they can access, visualise, analyse and understand statistics. The 2016 ASGS will be used for the 2016 Census of Population and Housing and progressively introduced into other ABS data collections. The ABS encourages the use of the ASGS by other organisations to improve the comparability and usefulness of statistics generally, and in analysis and visualisation of statistical and other data.

This publication, Australian Statistical Geography Standard (ASGS) Volume 1 - Main Structure and Greater Capital City Statistical Areas (cat no. 1270.0.55.001), deals with the ASGS Main Structure (Statistical Areas Level 1 - 4) and the Greater Capital City Statistical Areas (GCCSA). It outlines the conceptual basis of the ASGS Main Structure and the GCCSAs and their relationships to each other. This product contains several elements including the ASGS manual, allocation tables, correspondences and the digital boundaries current for the ASGS Edition 2016 (date of effect 1 July 2016).

The digital boundaries for Volume 1 of the ASGS are the region types for the main structure and the GCCSAs. These region types are:

  • Mesh Block (MB)
  • Statistical Area Level 1 (SA1)
  • Statistical Area Level 2 (SA2)
  • Statistical Area Level 3 (SA3)
  • Statistical Area Level 4 (SA4)
  • Greater Capital City Statistical Areas (GCCSA)
  • State and Territory (S/T)
  • Australia (AUS).

File Nomenclature:

Mesh Block file names have the format <file type>_<2016>_<STATE> where:
<file type> represents the type of boundaries in each file
MB = Mesh Block
<2016> represents 2016 the year of the Australian Statistical Geography Standard (ASGS) Edition
< STATE> indicates the data covers a State as defined in the ASGS manual

Other file names have the format <file type>_<2016>_<AUST> where:
<file type> represents the type of boundaries in each file
SA1 = Statistical Area Level 1
SA2 = Statistical Area Level 2
SA3 = Statistical Area Level 3
SA4 = Statistical Area Level 4
GCCSA = Greater Capital City Statistical Area
STE = State and Territory
AUS = Australia
<2016> represents 2016 the year of the Australian Statistical Geography Standard (ASGS) Edition
< AUST> indicates the data covers all of Australia as defined in the ASGS manual

Within the files, the States and Territories are identified by unique one digit codes.

State and Territory Codes and Names

Code S/T

1 New South Wales
2 Victoria
3 Queensland
4 South Australia
5 Western Australia
6 Tasmania
7 Northern Territory
8 Australian Capital Territory
9 Other Territories



File Attributes:

All tables show file type, file name, spatial unit field and the data type.

File Type: Mesh Block (MB)

File Name (s): MB_2016_NSW; MB_2016_VIC; MB_2016_QLD; MB_2016_SA; MB_2016_WA; MB_2016_TAS; MB_2016_NT; MB_2016_ACT & MB_2016_OT

Count Field (mid/mif, TAB and GeoPackage) Field (ESRI .shp) Data Type Ideal LengthProvided Length

1 MB_CODE_2016 MB_CODE16 Character1111
2 MB_CATEGORY_2016 MB_CAT16 Character5030
3 SA1_MAINCODE_2016 SA1_MAIN16 Character1111
4 SA1_7DIGITCODE_2016 SA1_7DIG16 Character728
5 SA2_MAINCODE_2016 SA2_MAIN16 Character99
6 SA2_5DIGITCODE_2016 SA2_5DIG16 Character520
7 SA2_NAME_2016 SA2_NAME16 Character5050
8 SA3_CODE_2016 SA3_CODE16 Character55
9 SA3_NAME_2016 SA3_NAME16 Character5050
10 SA4_CODE_2016 SA4_CODE16 Character33
11 SA4_NAME_2016 SA4_NAME16 Character5050
12 GCCSA_CODE_2016 GCC_CODE16 Character55
13 GCCSA_NAME_2016 GCC_NAME16 Character5050
14 STATE_CODE_2016 STE_CODE16 Character13
15 STATE_NAME_2016 STE_NAME16 Character5050
16 AREA_ALBERS_SQKM AREASQKM16Float



File Type: Statistical Area Level 1 (SA1)

File Name (s): SA1_2016_AUST

Count Field (mid/mif, TAB and GeoPackage)Field (ESRI shp) Data Type Ideal LengthProvided Length

1 SA1_MAINCODE_2016 SA1_MAIN16 Character1111
2 SA1_7DIGITCODE_2016 SA1_7DIG16 Character728
3 SA2_MAINCODE_2016 SA2_MAIN16 Character99
4 SA2_5DIGITCODE_2016 SA2_5DIG16 Character520
5 SA2_NAME_2016 SA2_NAME16 Character5050
6 SA3_CODE_2016 SA3_CODE16 Character55
7 SA3_NAME_2016 SA3_NAME16 Character5050
8 SA4_CODE_2016 SA4_CODE16 Character33
9 SA4_NAME_2016 SA4_NAME16 Character5050
10 GCCSA_CODE_2016 GCC_CODE16 Character 55
11 GCCSA_NAME_2016 GCC_NAME16 Character 5050
12 STATE_CODE_2016 STE_CODE16 Character13
13 STATE_NAME_2016 STE_NAME16 Character5050
14 AREA_ALBERS_SQKMAREASQKM16Float



File Type: Statistical Area Level 2 (SA2)

File Name (s): SA2_2016_AUST

Count Field (mid/mif, TAB and GeoPackage)Field (ESRI shp) Data Type Ideal LengthProvided Length

1 SA2_MAINCODE_2016 SA2_MAIN16 Character99
2 SA2_5DIGITCODE_2016 SA2_5DIG16 Character520
3 SA2_NAME_2016 SA2_NAME16 Character5050
4 SA3_CODE_2016 SA3_CODE16 Character55
5 SA3_NAME_2016 SA3_NAME16 Character 5050
6 SA4_CODE_2016 SA4_CODE16 Character33
7 SA4_NAME_2016 SA4_NAME16 Character5050
8 GCCSA_CODE_2016 GCC_CODE16 Character55
9 GCCSA_NAME_2016 GCC_NAME16 Character5050
10 STATE_CODE_2016 STE_CODE16 Character13
11 STATE_NAME_2016 STE_NAME16 Character 5050
12 AREA_ALBERS_SQKM AREASQKM16Float



File Type: Statistical Area Level 3 (SA3)

File Name (s): SA3_2016_AUST

Count Field (mid/mif, TAB and GeoPackage)Field (ESRI shp) Data Type Ideal LengthProvided Length

1 SA3_CODE_2016 SA3_CODE16 Character55
2 SA3_NAME_2016 SA3_NAME16 Character5050
3 SA4_CODE_2016 SA4_CODE16 Character33
4 SA4_NAME_2016 SA4_NAME16 Character5050
5 GCCSA_CODE_2016 GCC_CODE16 Character55
6 GCCSA_NAME_2016 GCC_NAME16 Character5050
7 STATE_CODE_2016 STE_CODE16 Character13
8 STATE_NAME_2016 STE_NAME16 Character 5050
9 AREA_ALBERS_SQKM AREASQKM16Float



File Type: Statistical Area Level 4 (SA4)

File Name (s): SA4_2016_AUST

Count Field (mid/mif, TAB and GeoPackage)Field (ESRI shp) Data Type Ideal LengthProvided Length

1 SA4_CODE_2016 SA4_CODE16 Character33
2 SA4_NAME_2016 SA4_NAME16 Character5050
3 GCCSA_CODE_2016 GCC_CODE16 Character55
4 GCCSA_NAME_2016 GCC_NAME16 Character5050
5 STATE_CODE_2016 STE_CODE16 Character13
6 STATE_NAME_2016 STE_NAME16 Character5050
7 AREA_ALBERS_SQKM AREASQKM16Float



File Type: Greater Capital City Statistical Area (GCCSA)

File Name (s): GCCSA_2016_AUST

Count Field (mid/mif, TAB and GeoPackage)Field (ESRI shp) Data Type Ideal LengthProvided Length

1 GCCSA_CODE_2016 GCC_CODE16 Character55
2 GCCSA_NAME_2016 GCC_NAME16 Character5050
3 STATE_CODE_2016 STE_CODE16 Character13
4 STATE_NAME_2016 STE_NAME16 Character5050
5 AREA_ALBERS_SQKM AREASQKM16Float



File Type: State and Territory (S/T)

File Name (s): STE_2016_AUST

Count Field (mid/mif, TAB and GeoPackage)Field (ESRI shp) Data Type Ideal LengthProvided Length

1 STATE_CODE_2016 STE_CODE16 Character13
2 STATE_NAME_2016 STE_NAME16 Character5050
3 AREA_ALBERS_SQKM AREASQKM16Float



File Type: Australia (AUS)

File Name (s): AUS_2016_AUST

Count Field (mid/mif, TAB and GeoPackage)Field (ESRI shp) Data Type LengthESRI shp Length

1 AUS_CODE_2016 AUS_CODE16 Character33
2 AUS_NAME_2016 AUS_NAME16 Character1050
3 AREA_ALBERS_SQKM AREASQKM16Float





XML METADATA FILE

The compressed download files include geospatial metadata data for each region type in Extensible Markup Language (XML) format. The geospatial metadata conforms to International Organisation for Standardization (ISO) geospatial metadata standard, ISO 19115:2003, and the associated XML implementation schema specified by ISO 19139:2012.


DATA CURRENCY

Date of Effect: 12 July 2016


DATASET STATUS

Progress: Completed dataset

Maintenance and Update Frequency: No further updates for these boundaries planned. There will be a progressive release of the other regions that make up the ASGS until late 2018 (ASGS Volumes 2, 3, 4 and 5). The ASGS will be revised in 2021.


ACCESS


Stored Data Format:

Digital as separate files for each level of the Main Structure and GCCSA of the ASGS 2016.

Available Format:

The digital boundary files are in MapInfo TAB format (.TAB), MapInfo Interchange Format (.MID .MIF), Geopackage and ESRI Shapefile (.shp) format.

Spatial Representation Type:

Vector

Access Constraints:

Copyright Commonwealth of Australia administered by the ABS. Unless otherwise noted, content is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 Australia licence.

Datum:

Geocentric Datum of Australia 1994 (GDA94)

The digital boundary files have the datum specified as 116 (GDA94). Users of MapInfo 6.0 or later are able to load data sets based on GDA94 directly, without transformation. Earlier versions of MapInfo cannot interpret GDA94 correctly and there may be alignment problems between data sets based on this datum and other earlier datums.

Projection:

Geographical (i.e. Latitudes and Longitudes)

Geographic Extent:

Geographic Australia.

Extent - Geographic Bounding Box:

North Bounding Latitude: -8
South Bounding Latitude: -45
West Bounding Latitude: 96
East Bounding Latitude: 169


DATA QUALITY

Lineage:

Mesh Block boundaries were created using various sources including the PSMA digital datasets and ABS boundaries, zoning information from state planning agencies and imagery.

Positional Accuracy:

Positional accuracy is an assessment of the closeness of the location of the spatial objects in relation to their true positions on the earth's surface.

The positional accuracy includes:
  • a horizontal accuracy assessment
  • a vertical accuracy assessment

Positional accuracy for ABS boundaries is dependent on the accuracy of the features they have been aligned to. ABS boundaries are aligned to a number of layers supplied by PSMA with an accuracy of +/-50 mm. PSMA layers and their positional accuracy are as follows:
  • Transport and Topography
+/- 2 meters in urban areas and +/- 10 meters in rural and remote areas
  • CadLite
+/- 2 meters in urban areas and +/- 10 meters in rural and remote areas
  • Administrative Boundaries
Derived from the cadastre data from each Australian State and Territory jurisdiction.
  • Greenspace and Hydrology
90% of well-defined features are within 1mm (at plot scale) of their true position, eg 1:500 equates to +/- 0.5metre and 1:25,000 equates to +/- 25 metres. Relative spatial accuracy of these themes reflects that of the jurisdictional source data. The accuracy is +/- 2 metres in urban areas and +/- 10 metres in rural and remote areas. No "shift" of data as a means of "cartographic enhancement" to facilitate presentation has been employed for any real world feature.

Attribute Accuracy:

All codes and labels for all levels within the ASGS Main Structure and GCCSAs are fully validated.

Logical Consistency:

Regions are closed polygons. Attribute records without spatial objects have been included in the data for administrative purposes.

Completeness:

All levels of the Main Structure and GCCSAs within the 2016 ASGS are represented.


CONTACT INFORMATION

Contact Organisation: Australian Bureau of Statistics

Contact: For further information email <client.services@abs.gov.au> or contact the National Information and Referral Service (NIRS) on 1300 135 070.