When you are using custom trade areas in ENVISION (e.g., drive times, radii, drawn, imported spatial files, etc) you may wonder how the underlying data are being measured, and how ENVISION decides whether or not to include it in your trade area.
The answer differs slightly depending on whether you are using an ENVISION Canada or USA workspace.
In Canada, data is apportioned at the Dissemination Area (DA) level. This methodology is used regardless of whether the workspace opens in new window is based on PRIZM at the postal code or DA level. The proportion of the DA that falls within your custom trade area is used to determine how much of the data from the DA to include. For example, if you have a DA that is roughly 25% inside your trade area, then roughly 25% of the data for that DA will be included in your trade area.
In USA, the data is apportioned at the Block level. All block centroids – within a block group located inside a trade area polygon – have their associated population, household or block centroid counts aggregated and expressed as a percentage of the block group’s total. This percentage is then used to apportion and aggregate data for any non-standard polygon.