Boundary year explained Demographic Concept

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A boundary year is the edition of ABS geography an area belongs to. The ABS redraws its boundaries every few years. The mesh blocks and statistical areas of one edition are shaped differently in the next.

Place Forecast keeps each edition just as the ABS drew it. An area code is unique only inside its own edition. The same code can point at a different piece of ground in the next one. So we read a figure on the edition its Census was published against.

Holding two editions at once is what lets a forecast show a 2016 Census figure next to a 2021 one for the same small area. A council draws its own small areas, and they sit in no edition at all. So each Census is shared out through the boundaries of its own year. Part of the step between two Census points comes from the boundaries themselves.