CMSAs and MSAs of 1 million or more population - download file available.

In the 1995 and 2001 NHTS surveys, households located in a metro area of 1 million or more population had their specific CMSA or MSA designation noted on the public use file. In the 2001 NHTS, the variable name was HHC_MSA and it included both CMSA or MSA designations, as appropriate.

When the variable HHC_MSA was produced for the 2009 NHTS, it inadvertently only contains the designations for the 18 CMSAs. To remedy that, we have created a downloadable file that contains the designations for all 50 areas of 1 million or more.

The file uses the following conventions:

nnnn - the 4-digit number of the applicable CMSA/MSA (per Census Bureau)
XXXX - the household is located in an MSA or less than 1 million
-1 - the household is not located in a CMSA or an MSA.

Note that we have also added a field for HH_CBSA (Core Based Statistical Area) because that is relatively new geographic designation, which will probably increase in use in the future. HH_CBSA is a 5-digit code, but other than that, the codes are currently the same as the CMSA and MSA codes for each area.

To update your NHTS data, simply sort and merge the variables on this file (HHC_MSA and HH_CBSA) on HOUSEID, the Household Identification Number.

Important Caveat - The NHTS sample is not selected to represent individual areas of one million or more, unless they were in an Add-on area. When we started identifying areas of 1 million or more on the public use file, it was done with the recognition that NHTS was the only source of national data on daily travel behavior that was consistent throughout the country. Identifying these major metro areas allows for some comparison on broad travel indicators, like mode split, average trip length, travel time distributions, etc.

Outside of Add-on sample areas, the MSA designations were never intended to represent all aspects of travel behavior in an MSA. We ask that the data user show common sense and discretion on how much detail to publish regarding any one area, and make liberal use of showing sample size of the variable attribute at the MSA level (i.e., not just the number of households, but number of trips, people or vehicles, as appropriate.)

The file can be downloaded here