# USA zip code. **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 26, 2018, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602 "2018-02-26T14:56:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![senoy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dbc845/32.png) [@senoy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/senoy)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2018, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602/21 "2018-02-26T21:52:15Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#): > > Yep. Why the U.S. and Canada doesn’t just give the Angle Inlet to Canada and dual citizenship all living residents (and kids who are born to U.S. Citizen parents who want to file the paperwork), beats the heck out of me. It can’t be easy to run that little piece of nowhere. Primarily because the vast majority if it is owned by the Red Lake Chippewa as part of their reservation. They don’t have a treaty with Canada that would protect their land and administering it across borders would be nearly impossible. Not to mention that First Nations People in Manitoba are treated like 12th class citizens as opposed to the US where they are only 2nd class. The legalities of giving reservation land to another country would tie any attempt to do so in the court system for years with no guarantee that the courts would side with the US government anyway. It’s just easier for everyone to maintain the status quo. ---
**Author:** ![Hari\_Seldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hari_seldon/32/5173_2.png) [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2018, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602/22 "2018-02-26T22:23:52Z")
[quote=“Dangerosa, post:12, topic:809602”] And there are kids who go to high school in Warroad Minnesota who get to go through the Canada on their way to and from school. Same with Point Robert, WA. At the end of her life, my mother lived in the “town” of Bryn Mawr, PA, 10910, which is not at all any political subdivision, but is a zip code and has a post office and lies mostly in Montgomery County, but has an extrusion into Delaware County. ---
**Author:** ![DSYoungEsq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c6cbf5/32.png) [@DSYoungEsq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSYoungEsq)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2018, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602/23 "2018-02-26T23:02:49Z")
> [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](#): > > Check out zip code 38079, as it encompasses the geographic anomaly known as Kentucky Bend, KY along with a lot of Tennessee. > > [https://www.maptechnica.com/zip-code-map/38079](https://www.maptechnica.com/zip-code-map/38079) Are there any others? I suspect that’s done for practical purposes, because it’s attached the way it is. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2018, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602/24 "2018-02-26T23:05:50Z")
> [@senoy](#): > > Primarily because the vast majority if it is owned by the Red Lake Chippewa as part of their reservation. They don’t have a treaty with Canada that would protect their land and administering it across borders would be nearly impossible. Not to mention that First Nations People in Manitoba are treated like 12th class citizens as opposed to the US where they are only 2nd class. The legalities of giving reservation land to another country would tie any attempt to do so in the court system for years with no guarantee that the courts would side with the US government anyway. It’s just easier for everyone to maintain the status quo. Well, that explains it. Thanks. ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2018, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602/25 "2018-02-26T23:16:22Z")
Even better, it looks like there are some areas that don’t have a Zip Code. Check the area around Fort Riley, KS near 66503 and 66531. The Texas Panhandle in areas surrounding 79083. Frazier Wells and areas of Coconino County, AZ. Giant chunks of Oregon, Nevada and Utah. ---
**Author:** ![glowacks](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/glowacks/32/5548_2.png) [@glowacks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/glowacks)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2018, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602/26 "2018-02-27T00:04:03Z")
Wikipedia article on the India/Bangladesh enclaves. > **[India–Bangladesh enclaves](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/India%E2%80%93Bangladesh_enclaves)** > > The India–Bangladesh enclaves, also known as the chiṭmahals (Bengali: ছিটমহল chiṭmôhôl) and sometimes called pasha enclaves, were the enclaves along the Bangladesh–India border, in Bangladesh and the Indian states of West Bengal, Tripura, Assam and Meghalaya. The main body of Bangladesh contained 102 Indian enclaves, which in turn contained 21 Bangladeshi counter-enclaves, one of which contained Dahala Khagrabari, an Indian counter-counter-enclave, the world's only third-order encl The Prime M... I wasn’t aware that it was actually settled several years ago. ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2018, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602/27 "2018-02-27T00:06:13Z")
> [@DSYoungEsq](#): > > Are there any others? I suspect that’s done for practical purposes, because it’s attached the way it is. 86432 seems to cover both AZ and UT, without the anomaly present in KY bend. [http://www.zipmap.net/Arizona.htm](http://www.zipmap.net/Arizona.htm) also 82930 ---
**Author:** ![Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/marvin_the_martian/32/2898_2.png) [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marvin_the_Martian)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2018, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602/28 "2018-02-27T00:15:21Z")
The city of Bethlehem, PA is split between two counties (Lehigh and Northampton). It has three main zip codes, all of which cross county lines (and two of which cross city lines). I’m sure the respective community colleges got pretty good at matching addresses to county… ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2018, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602/29 "2018-02-27T00:43:07Z")
Heck, There’s an Area Code that crosses the US/Canadian border: 418 covers a lot of Quebec, plus that tiny bit of Estcourte Ste. in Maine. Off topic, I know. Apologies. Thanks to my daughter **elfbabe** for pointing it out to me. ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2018, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602/30 "2018-02-27T00:51:51Z")
The town I grew up in was in two counties, with Main Street the county line. All one zip code. Same school district. I crossed the county line twice a day to go to school. Sales tax is slightly different on each side of Main Street. The little town of Wisconsin Dells,Wisconsin, is in five counties within city limits. Same zip. ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2018, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602/31 "2018-02-27T01:14:07Z")
Do area codes only stay in one state? Kansas City, KS and MO are conspicuously different area codes. > [@OldGuy](#): > > Was it worse than the Belgian-Netherlands border in Baarle Nassau and Baarle Hertog? > > [Baarle Nassau and Baarle Hertog](http://ontology.buffalo.edu/smith//baarle.htm) Well as mentioned it’s apparently fixed, but BE/NL are EU/Schengen, so people can just walk across the border. The India/Pakistan thing meant that some people were basically trapped. > [@Hari\_Seldon](#): > > At the end of her life, my mother lived in the “town” of Bryn Mawr, PA, 10910, which is not at all any political subdivision, but is a zip code and has a post office and lies mostly in Montgomery County, but has an extrusion into Delaware County. “Census-designated place” is the term. Which doesn’t mean much by itself as far as explanation, East Los Angeles is a CDP and more than 120,000 people. It usually means that they don’t have city services, but contract out, like the police duties are done by the highway patrol. > [@DSYoungEsq](#): > > Are there any others? I suspect that’s done for practical purposes, because it’s attached the way it is. The Kentucky Bend is based on the historical territories, only now an oxbow bend formed in the river and moved the land. ---
**Author:** ![Alley\_Dweller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alley_dweller/32/430_2.png) [@Alley\_Dweller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alley_Dweller)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2018, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602/32 "2018-02-27T03:08:57Z")
> [@DSYoungEsq](#): > > We have such a street here in Indian Land, SC. To get to the dead end houses, you have to go through **another state** (North Carolina). Mapping software routinely shows the state boundary deviating around the street, presumably because they can’t believe that what really happens could happen. It’s a painfully long bus ride for those kids. ☹ So if you are out on bail or a court, for some other reason, orders you not to leave the state (or take your child out of the state), are you in violation of your bail conditions or in contempt of court if you go home after the hearing? ---
**Author:** ![Keeve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f07891/32.png) [@Keeve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Keeve)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2018, 4:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602/33 "2018-02-27T04:15:51Z")
I always thought that the most famous example of a place having the ZIP code of another state was [Fishers Island, New York](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fishers_Island,_New_York) > [@Wikipedia](#): > > Despite being a part of New York, in many ways the island has closer links with Connecticut, 2 miles (3 km) to its north, than with the rest of New York, 10 miles (16 km) to the southwest. Fishers Island’s zip code is 06390, corresponding to Connecticut zip codes that begin with “06”, while other residential zip codes in New York State begin with “1”. The island is the only point in Suffolk County to which telephone calls placed from the greater New York City area are classified as long distance rather than regional. The island is also part of the Boy Scouts of America’s Connecticut Rivers Council. The island is part of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Norwich (Connecticut), while the remainder of Suffolk County is included in the Diocese of Rockville Centre. ---
**Author:** ![Mr\_Downtown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Mr\_Downtown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr_Downtown)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2018, 5:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602/34 "2018-02-27T05:15:14Z")
Though people find it convenient think of them as polygons with boundaries, ZIP codes are more properly regarded as lists of addresses served by particular post offices or carrier routes. It’s common for all addresses—on both sides—of a street that _looks_ like it’s the ZIP code boundary to have the same ZIP code. You can represent that by putting the boundary in the alley to the rear if you like, but other situations are not so easily resolved. > [@thelurkinghorror](#): > > Do area codes only stay in one state? Always. Phone companies in areas such as Kansas City or Texarkana generally had arrangements for such calls to be charged only as local calls—even though nowadays the different area code often must be dialed. > [@](#): > > “Census-designated place” is the term. Which doesn’t mean much by itself as far as explanation, East Los Angeles is a CDP and more than 120,000 people. It usually means that they don’t have city services, but contract out, like the police duties are done by the highway patrol. Well, “census-designated place” only really means that the Census Bureau thinks enough people will want to know statistical info about it that they give it a name and census boundaries. The arrangements for local government services, and postal delivery, are completely separate. The Las Vegas Strip is unincorporated Clark County, for instance. Hawai’i has no municipal governments at all. And many incorporated suburbs contract with an adjacent municipality, or with the county, for fire or police protection. ---
**Author:** ![OldGuy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/3bc359/32.png) [@OldGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OldGuy)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2018, 5:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602/35 "2018-02-27T05:18:55Z")
> [@thelurkinghorror](#): > > The Kentucky Bend is based on the historical territories, only now an oxbow bend formed in the river and moved the land. Certainly an oxbow formed in the river, and I’ve seen guesses that it was caused by the New Madrid earthquake, but I’ve read other claims that the oxbow predates the founding of the original North Carolina-Virginia border which became the Tennessee-Kentucky border so that like Point Roberts it’s just a surveying artifact. ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2018, 5:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602/36 "2018-02-27T05:28:44Z")
> [@OldGuy](#): > > Certainly an oxbow formed in the river, and I’ve seen guesses that it was caused by the New Madrid earthquake, but I’ve read other claims that the oxbow predates the founding of the original North Carolina-Virginia border which became the Tennessee-Kentucky border so that like Point Roberts it’s just a surveying artifact. I believe it predates when they were states or even territories, but after they were set aside as western part of VA and NC. ---
**Author:** ![Lord\_Feldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lord_feldon/32/341_2.png) [@Lord\_Feldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Feldon)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2018, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602/37 "2018-02-27T06:39:24Z")
> [@DSYoungEsq](#): > > Are there any others? I suspect that’s done for practical purposes, because it’s attached the way it is. I can’t find anything newer, but in 1994 there were 153 according to [the Census](https://www.census.gov/population/www/documentation/twps0007/twps0007.html): > [@](#): > > There are 153 ZIP Codes in more than one state. There are 9,000 ZIP Codes in more than one county. ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2018, 8:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602/38 "2018-02-27T08:27:49Z")
A couple of other highly populated places are Shawnee Mission,Kansas, and Metairie, Louisiana. They are suburbs of big cities, but are administrated only as non-municipal areas in their respective counties. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2018, 9:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602/39 "2018-02-27T09:46:11Z")
And another example is Silver Spring, Maryland: > **[Silver Spring, Maryland](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silver_Spring,_Maryland)** > > Silver Spring is a census-designated place (CDP) in southeastern Montgomery County, Maryland, United States, near Washington, D.C. Although officially unincorporated, in practice it is an edge city, with a population of 81,015 at the 2020 census, making it the fifth-most populous place in Maryland after Baltimore, Columbia, Germantown, and Waldorf. > Downtown, next to the northern tip of Washington, D.C., is the oldest and most urbanized part of the community, surrounded by several inner suburba... ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2018, 3:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602/40 "2018-02-27T15:12:49Z")
> [@thelurkinghorror](#): > > Do area codes only stay in one state? NOT always. The one exception I know of, mentioned in my earlier post, is 418, covering part of Quebec, CA and a tiny, tiny bit of Maine. 🆒 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-zip-code/809602.md?page=3)