Old census links often disappear long before the statistic that depended on them stops circulating. Catalogue 2068.0 is one of those links.
What catalogue 2068.0 was
The Australian Bureau of Statistics released its 2006 Census Tables progressively through 2007. The product was designed for people who wanted a table on one topic for one selected geographic area, without downloading an entire national dataset.
Users chose a location, selected a subject and downloaded an Excel table. The available material covered many of the Census form’s central themes: population, families, dwellings, employment, travel and other characteristics that could be compared between places.
The archived ABS product page recorded two principal release periods, running from June through September 2007 and then from October to December. It also noted later corrections and additions, including new geographic boundaries.
The Gold Coast travel-to-work reference
One old Gold Coast citation pointed into this system for a table titled “Method of Travel to Work by Sex – Gold Coast (Local Government Area)”. The link was used to support discussion of the car’s dominant role in local commuting.
That original URL was generated by the retired interactive service. It included area code LGA33460, the 2006 Census period and the topic “Transport Access & Use”. Once the service was withdrawn, the deep link no longer resolved to its spreadsheet.
The important distinction is between the source and the interface. The dead link does not mean the 2006 Census vanished; it means the old table-selection application and its generated download route were retired. ABS now directs researchers to historical Census products, Community Profiles and TableBuilder for comparable work.
How to use the figure responsibly
A 2006 travel pattern is historical evidence, not a description of today’s commute. Since then the Gold Coast has added light rail, expanded heavy-rail planning, changed road capacity and grown substantially.
The old table is still useful when the question is how the city travelled at that time. It should not be presented as a current modal split or used for present-day transport planning without newer data beside it.
