Skip to main content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Official websites use .gov
A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.

Secure .gov websites use HTTPS
A lock ( ) or https:// means you’ve safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

Skip to content
  • Feedback

    • Rural-Urban Commuting Area Codes

    Metadata Updated: January 3, 2024

    The rural-urban commuting area codes (RUCA) classify U.S. census tracts using measures of urbanization, population density, and daily commuting from the decennial census.

    The most recent RUCA codes are based on data from the 2000 decennial census. The classification contains two levels. Whole numbers (1-10) delineate metropolitan, micropolitan, small town, and rural commuting areas based on the size and direction of the primary (largest) commuting flows. These 10 codes are further subdivided to permit stricter or looser delimitation of commuting areas, based on secondary (second largest) commuting flows. The approach errs in the direction of more codes, providing flexibility in combining levels to meet varying definitional needs and preferences.

    The 1990 codes are similarly defined. However, the Census Bureau's methods of defining urban cores and clusters changed between the two censuses. And, census tracts changed in number and shapes. The 2000 rural-urban commuting codes are not directly comparable with the 1990 codes because of these differences.

    An update of the Rural-Urban Commuting Area Codes is planned for late 2013.

    Access & Use Information

    Public: This dataset is intended for public access and use. License: Creative Commons CCZero

    Downloads & Resources

    Dates

    Metadata Created Date November 10, 2020
    Metadata Updated Date January 3, 2024

    Metadata Source

    Harvested from USDA JSON

    Other Data Resources

    Additional Metadata

    Resource Type Dataset
    Metadata Created Date November 10, 2020
    Metadata Updated Date January 3, 2024
    Publisher Economic Research Service, Department of Agriculture
    Maintainer
    Identifier USDA-ERS-00086
    Data First Published 2019-10-24
    Data Last Modified 2019-10-24
    Public Access Level public
    Bureau Code 005:13
    Metadata Context https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
    Schema Version https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
    Catalog Describedby https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
    Data Dictionary http://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/rural-urban-commuting-area-codes/documentation.aspx
    Harvest Object Id a785fb96-f72e-4051-a71c-fc5abe6a5722
    Harvest Source Id d3fafa34-0cb9-48f1-ab1d-5b5fdc783806
    Harvest Source Title USDA JSON
    Homepage URL http://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/rural-urban-commuting-area-codes.aspx
    License https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/
    Old Spatial United States
    Program Code 005:041
    Source Datajson Identifier True
    Source Hash 9bf9dfe67234b906505b3529b8e2e524a6567457320fc417af0c9e12d90ae225
    Source Schema Version 1.1
    Spatial {"type":"Polygon","coordinates":-124.733253,24.544245,-124.733253,49.388611,-66.954811,49.388611,-66.954811,24.544245,-124.733253,24.544245}

    Didn't find what you're looking for? Suggest a dataset here.