Question:
I am assisting a researcher who is looking to determine the area of 2006 Dissemination Areas. Does this exist as a statistical product?
I noticed that the shapefiles have a generated “shape_area” field and am wondering if anyone knows if this field is reliable, or if it poses a Modifiable Areal Units Problem (MAUP)?
Answer:
If you don't want to use GIS software, I'm pleased to say that, once again, GeoSuite comes to the rescue. There's a DAarea field in GeoSuite that gives area in km2. According to the help file "Land area data are unofficial and are provided for the sole purpose of calculating population density."
