Canada Postal Codes - Forward Sortation Areas
Custom postal code maps, grouped by forward sortation area (FSA), can be made for anywhere in Canada. FSAs are the first three characters of a postal code that represent roughly the same area as 5-digit Zip Codes in the United States. These attractive and informative maps include extensive geographic detail including: provincial highways; streets and street names at detailed scales; cities and towns; and, counties and province names and boundaries.
Ideal for service delivery, retail siting, sales region planning and many other business and organizational functions.
Canada Postal Codes - Forward Sortation Areas
Canadian Postal Codes are a six-character alphanumeric string in the format A1A 1A1. The Forward Sortation Area forms the initial component of the Canadian Postal Code. It designates a geographical unit based on the first three characters in a postal code.
How is Forward Sortation Area structured?
The term Forward Sortation Area describes a geographical region where all the postal codes begin with the same three characters. A postal address that reads like K1A OH5, that has two sections. The initial section of three alphanumeric characters is the FSA or Forward Sortation Area and the final section of the postal address is known as the LDU or Local Delivery Unit.
E1B 1H8Every Forward Sortation Area (FSA) code within a postal address provides information about its structure:
The initial letter used in the address is for identification of the territory, province or a particular ‘postal district’. For example, E represents New Brunswick.
The second character is a numeral (1,2) that identifies whether the area is under rural or urban jurisdiction. It represents a specific rural region, an entire medium-sized city, or a section of a major metropolitan area. A zero in the postal address indicates a wide-area rural region, whereas all other digits indicate urban areas.
The third character (B) is a letter that identifies a more precise location when grouped with the initial two characters. For example - a geographic district, a particular rural or urban region, a medium-sized city or a section of a major metropolitan area
This a tabular representation of the Canadian Postal Codes, organized by first letter.
Provinces/Territories | Postal Codes |
---|---|
Newfoundland and Labrador (NL) | A |
Nova Scotia (NS) | B |
Prince Edward Island (PE) | C |
New Brunswick (NB) | E |
Quebec (QC) | G,H,J |
Ontario (ON) | K,L,M,N,P |
Manitoba (MB) | R |
Saskatchewan (SK) | S |
Alberta (AB) | T |
British Columbia (BC) | V |
Nunavut (NU) | X |
Northwest Territories (NT) | X |
Yukon (YT) | Y |
The postal abbreviations of territories vary depending on the initials or final letters. Some are named after the first and last letter, while others from the first and some other letter in the name. The Forward Sortation Areas mentioned in Postal Addresses specify all communities covered by each rural FSA. For medium-sized cities, there can be one designated FSA, whereas, for larger cities, there can be more than one.
SKU | ecfe74dcf99c2bec1d4450323d39fec2 |
---|---|
Map Specification | Max Print Scale - 1:20,000 Min Print Scale - 1:500,000 Optimal Print Scale - All |
Publisher Name | MapSherpa |