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Census merged wards (E+W) 2011 Boundaries (Generalised, Clipped)

This file contains the digital vector boundaries for Census merged wards as at December 2011 for England and Wales.

Census merged wards are referred to as 2011 Census merged wards.
Census merged wards are a frozen geography created specifically for 2011 Census Detailed Characteristics (DC) tables. DC tables have a higher minimum population threshold than other tables as the more detailed information carries an increased risk of identifying persons or households using the lower population threshold (100 persons) applied to other tables.
If the Census estimate for a ward falls below 1,000 persons or 400 households, the ward is merged with a neighbouring ward, or wards, until the aggregated Census estimate for the merged wards is above both the minimum person (1,000) and household (400) threshold.
Merged wards include 2011 wards whose estimates are above the higher threshold, without the need to merge with another 2011 ward, as well as merged wards. This gives complete coverage of England and Wales. These unmerged wards have the same boundaries as their equivalent 2011 ward, but are given a different entity code (for Census merged wards) to the entity code of the 2011 ward.

Local authority districts (LAD) is a generic term to describe the 'district' level of local government in England and Wales. It includes non-metropolitan districts, metropolitan districts, unitary authorities and London boroughs in England; and Welsh unitary authorities. The areas are made up of whole electoral wards/divisions.

For the creation of the 2011 Census boundaries a policy decision was made to update local authority district changes to the original 2001 Census boundaries rather than align to 2011 Boundary-Line. This was to ensure where an OA/LSOA/MSOA hasn't been maintained it will be topologically the same as in 2001 and therefore better for time series analysis and stability, a frozen geography where possible and as originally planned.

Customers may find it helpful to use the 2011 statutory electoral ward/division boundaries along with the 2011 Census merged ward boundaries when trying to make comparisons between the 2011 electoral ward/divisions and the 2011 Census merged wards.

The boundaries are Intermediate/Generalised (20m). Intermediate datasets are designed for high quality mapping, preserving much of the original detail from the full dataset, but typically 10% of the file size. They are great when used in conjunction with the OS raster products and for producing detailed regional and local maps, or large wall maps. They are also suitable for non-demanding GIS analyses (such as buffering). Intermediate datasets are a good compromise between detail and small file size. They have also been clipped to the clipped to the coastline (Mean High Water mark), giving the coastline a more orthodox appearance.

Please note that this product contains both Ordnance Survey and ONS Intellectual Property Rights.

2015-09-24 10:41:11

2013-05-03T00:00:00

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