Standard Geographies

Available with Business Analyst license.

Overview

Standard Geographies are trade areas based on standard boundaries such as states, counties, tracts, ZIP Codes, block groups, census tracts, core-based statistical areas (CBSA), designated market areas (DMA) or places. Individual trade areas are created for each unique geography (for example, each state, each ZIP Code) that you select. One layer can contain several trade areas, such as one whole layer containing a collection of counties.

Standard Geographies can be created in three ways:

• Importing from a list
• Selecting from a geography tree
• Selecting from a map

Note:

Standard Geographies can be run in the background or foreground in the 64-bit environment. Business Analyst 64-bit background geoprocessing is installed during the product setup and is the default processing option. You can switch between background or foreground options from Geoprocessing menu > Geoprocessing Options > Background Geoprocessing section. Running tasks in the background allows you to continue your work in ArcMap as the task executes.

To enable, or disable, background processing navigate to the General tab of the tool properties and check, or uncheck, the Always run in foreground check box.

Read more about 64-bit Background Geoprocessing.

Input Prerequisites

None.

Example Output

In the example below, Standard Geographies are created for several ZIP Code boundaries in the Los Angeles area. This layer is a collection of ZIP Codes.

Learn more about Standard Geographies.