The TIGER system: automating the geographic structure of the United States census

The success of a census rests not only on how well the Bureau of the Census collects data, but also on how well the Census Bureau links those data to geographic areas. Problems with the geographic materials produced for the 1980 census caused confusion on the part of the Census Bureau's field staff, the staff processing the collected data, and the users of the resulting information. To avoid similar problems in 1990, the Geography Division of the Census Bureau is developing an automated geographic system that will support numerous Census Bureau operations beginning with the 1990 Decennial Census. A major component of this automated system is the computer-readable map data being developed in cooperation with the US Geological Survey using their 1:100-000-scale map series as the source.