Thank you for visiting
the MSA Maps Project.
MSA Maps is a product
of the Center for Social and Demographic Analysis and
the Lewis Mumford Center for Comparative Urban and Regional
Research at the University at Albany, created under
the direction of Richard Alba and Glenn Deane and developed
and supported by the GIS unit of CSDA and the Mumford
Our MSA Maps Project
is a national county-level map-based information system
developed with ArcIMS to display 2003 MSA boundaries
and boundary changes and to map a wide selection of
variables from the annual American Community Surveys,
including immigration, race, economic, housing, education,
veteran status, age and disability, poverty, and household
composition. The system allows users to download
and save the map data into a spreadsheet compatible
Before you begin, please
make sure you are using Internet Explorer or a version
of Netscape higher than 4.7 as your browser.
You can access the MSA
boundary changes and MSA ACS thematic maps and start
our interactive mapping applications by clicking the
selected buttons at the bottom of this page. When
you choose MSA boundary changes, a national map appears
that displays both 2003 MSA county boundaries and boundary
changes from the 2000 metropolitan area definitions.
When you choose MSA ACS
thematic maps, a new window appears with a list of data
sources, ACS 2000 - ACS 2006, along the top of the page.
Choose a survey year, then "Choose a Category"
and "Choose a variable" to display a quantile
map. After choosing a category and variable, use
the zoom-in tool () found on
the tool bar above the map and click on the map in the
area of desired counties.
For more information
about using our MSA Maps Project, click on our HELP
menu button in the upper right corner of the Map Window.
This HELP page includes examples of how to use MSA Maps.
You can also click on the Abbreviations button
for a key to the variable name abbreviations used throughout
the MSA ACS thematic maps application.