The TIGER/Line Files are shapefiles and related database files (.dbf) that are an extract of selected geographic and cartographic information from the U.S. Census Bureau's Master Address File / Topologically Integrated Geographic Encoding and Referencing (MAF/TIGER) Database (MTDB). The MTDB represents a seamless national file with no overlaps or gaps between parts, however, each TIGER/Line File is designed to stand alone as an independent data set, or they can be combined to cover the entire nation. Census Blocks are statistical areas bounded on all sides by visible features, such as streets, roads, streams, and railroad tracks, and/or by nonvisible boundaries such as city, town, township, and county limits, and short line-of-sight extensions of streets and roads. Census blocks are relatively small in area; for example, a block in a city bounded by streets. However, census blocks in remote areas are often large and irregular and may even be many square miles in area. A common misunderstanding is that data users think census blocks are used geographically to build all other census geographic areas, rather all other census geographic areas are updated and then used as the primary constraints, along with roads and water features, to delineate the tabulation blocks. As a result, all 2010 Census blocks nest within every other 2010 Census geographic area, so that Census Bureau statistical data can be tabulated at the block level and aggregated up to the appropriate geographic areas. Census blocks cover all territory in the United States, Puerto Rico, and the Island Areas (American Samoa, Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, and the U.S. Virgin Islands). Blocks are the smallest geographic areas for which the Census Bureau publishes data from the decennial census. A block may consist of one or more faces.

Field Definiiton:

STATEFP10 - 2010 Census State FIPS codes

COUNTYFP10 - 2010 Census County FIPS Codes

TRACTCE10 - 2010 Census Census Tract code

BLOCKCE10 - 2010 Census Census block code

GEOID10 - "Census block group identifier; a concatenation of 2010 Census state FIPS code, county FIPS code, and census tract code, and the block group number"

NAME10 - 2010 Census translated legal/statistical area description and the block group number

MTFCC10 - 2010 Census MAF/TIGER featture class code

UR10 - 2010 Census Urban/Rural

UACE10 - 2010 Census Urban Area

FUNCSTAT10 - 2010 Census Functional Statitical Code

ALAND10 - 2010 Census Area Land

AWATER10 - 2010 Census Area water

INTPTLAT10 - 2010 Census Internal Point (Latitude)

INTPTLON10 - 2010 Census Internal Point (Longtitude)

POPULATION - Total Population

HOUSING_UNITS - Total Housing units