statistical division
Areas cut for counting, kept stable over time, often named after the quarter they contain.
A statistical division is a division whose areas exist so figures can be collected and compared. A statistics office defines them, and their boundaries follow lines a counter can recognize on the ground, such as streets, railways and watercourses.
Stability over time is the design goal, because the figures are compared from one survey to the next. The areas therefore change less often than the settlement pattern they cover, and an area may keep a name whose everyday meaning has drifted away from it.
Such an area often bears the name of the quarter it mostly covers, which makes it look administrative. The test is the authority: a statistics office defines it and no council answers for it. Where a municipality maintains the names and boundaries itself, the division is administrative.
Related definitions
-
administrative division
Official named areas a municipality maintains, without a council of their own. -
cadastral division
Land-register areas holding the parcels, usually the pre-merger village boundaries. -
ecclesiastical division
Parishes and church districts, drawn by a religious body for its own congregations. -
electoral division
Constituencies drawn to elect someone to a body above, redrawn as population shifts. -
judicial division
Areas assigning a place to the court competent for it, so a matter is heard in the right one. -
military division
Areas under military authority, such as a garrison, training ground or closed zone. -
natural division
Areas set by the terrain itself, such as a valley, a basin, a range or an island group. -
planning division
Areas a plan or program applies to, lasting only as long as the program does. -
political division
Areas with an elected council or representative of their own, set by the municipality. -
postal division
Delivery areas of a postal operator, cut for routes rather than for places. -
protected division
Conservation areas where what may be done with the land is restricted by law. -
school division
Catchment areas assigning an address to the school it is entitled to attend. -
service division
Supply and response areas of a utility or emergency service, cut by network and driving time. -
tenure division
Areas a use right runs over, such as a hunting, forestry or fishing ground. -
traditional division
Territories held under customary law, recognized by those who live under it. -
vernacular division
Names people use for parts of a place, with edges nobody has ever fixed by an authority.