The Boston ArchiveBoston, Massachusetts

Dataset

Boston Neighborhood Boundaries approximated by 2020 Census Block Groups

The Census Bureau does not recognize or release data for Boston neighborhoods. However, Census block groups can be aggregated to approximate Boston neighborhood boundaries to allow for reporting and visualization of Census data at the neighborhood level. Census block groups are created by the U.S.…

Dataset

Publisher
Planning Department
Spatial coverage
all
Keywords
2020, GIS, block groups, census
Publisher's page
https://data.boston.gov/dataset/census-2020-block-group-neighborhoods

Artifacts

“Preserved” means the archive holds the bytes and their digest. “Referenced” means it holds the record of them and nothing more. The archive does not claim a holding it cannot prove.

FormatPreservationSizeDigestSource
GeoJSONpreserved3223049917afa67c77b3f7a4e13637b21af60ec348cee0cd18bca92a0c87adf9d7134fsource
PDFpreserved350220677205a017e3e7afa8fe76f1cf22b0bf8e91d47de2fa37e2ddc0b6cda27741a2esource
SHPpreserved890616ca30739cf9905e357fa11fa70139cea72357be011328ca0899d4e6f454f9aa7source

Questions this record answers

Each answer is composed only from fields this record carries, and names the attestation for what it says. A question the record cannot answer from its own attested content is not asked here. Where a boundary is described as official it was promulgated by an authority with the power to draw it and is not amended by anything on the vernacular layer; where it is described as vernacular it is held by attestation alone and amends no official boundary.

Who publishes Boston Neighborhood Boundaries approximated by 2020 Census Block Groups, and under what license?

Planning Department publishes it. The archive accessioned it under Open Data Commons Public Domain Dedication and Licence (PDDL) 1.0 (public domain), and holds the publisher's own column dictionary verbatim rather than reworded into the archive's vocabulary — how a publisher names a column is evidence about the publisher.

Attested by: City of Boston Open Data Portal (Analyze Boston), retrieved 2 September 2026, under Open Data Commons Public Domain Dedication and Licence (PDDL) 1.0.

What does Boston Neighborhood Boundaries approximated by 2020 Census Block Groups cover?

In space, all.

Attested by: City of Boston Open Data Portal (Analyze Boston), retrieved 2 September 2026, under Open Data Commons Public Domain Dedication and Licence (PDDL) 1.0.

Can the archive hand back the bytes of Boston Neighborhood Boundaries approximated by 2020 Census Block Groups?

Yes, for 3 of 3 distributions. Each preserved artifact is served at its own address with the digest recorded at retrieval emitted in an x-archive-sha256 header, and is handed over as an attachment: preserved material is evidence, not content, and is never rendered on this origin.

Attested by: City of Boston Open Data Portal (Analyze Boston), retrieved 2 September 2026, under Open Data Commons Public Domain Dedication and Licence (PDDL) 1.0.

What does the archive hold for Boston Neighborhood Boundaries approximated by 2020 Census Block Groups, and under what license?

The Boston Archive holds this record of Boston Neighborhood Boundaries approximated by 2020 Census Block Groups from City of Boston Open Data Portal (Analyze Boston), retrieved 2 September 2026, under Open Data Commons Public Domain Dedication and Licence (PDDL) 1.0 (public domain). 2 recorded transforms stand between the retrieved bytes and this record. Attribution is due to City of Boston.

Attested by: City of Boston Open Data Portal (Analyze Boston), retrieved 2 September 2026, under Open Data Commons Public Domain Dedication and Licence (PDDL) 1.0.

Identity

Identifier
urn:lemay:boston:dataset:census-2020-block-group-neighborhoods
Canonical URL
https://boston.fyi/dataset/census-2020-block-group-neighborhoods
As JSON
https://boston.fyi/dataset/census-2020-block-group-neighborhoods.json
Version
2 · last changed 13 September 2026

Provenance

Source
City of Boston Open Data Portal (Analyze Boston) — source of record
License
Open Data Commons Public Domain Dedication and Licence (PDDL) 1.0 (public_domain)
Retrieved
2 September 2026
Source identifier
census-2020-block-group-neighborhoods
Attribution
City of Boston
Rights as stated
Open Data Commons Public Domain Dedication and License (PDDL)

Transform ladder

#OperationDescriptionTool
1fetchretrieved the dataset's metadata record from the CKAN package_show endpointarchive-ingest 0.1.0
2normalizemapped the portal's catalog fields onto the archive's Dataset record; the publisher's own wording and column dictionary are preserved verbatimarchive-ingest 0.1.0