The primary topic area on boundary delimitation sets out the criteria and process for establishing boundaries of electoral areas. The electoral law or regulations then normally establish criteria for the selection of a polling site or sites to serve the electoral area. Whilst in any electoral law the ideal solution is to have identical polling sites which all work efficiently with the optimum number of electors that is rarely possible in practice.
Electoral areas vary greatly in terms of geographical characteristics.
Some may be serving densely populated urban areas where the polling site covers an area with a radius of only a few hundred metres from the polling site. In other more rural areas with low population density, polling sites can often serve electors from an area of many square miles involving extensive travel to the polling site from electors in the more remote locations from the site. In Macedonia many voters have to travel up to 20kms and in Moldova polling sites are established in railway stations for those who have to travel to vote. In many cases the electoral law leaves it to a local electoral commission or local electoral official to select a site. These stations are usually used in remote rural areas and the mobile polling station can visit many separate sites over several days, to avoid electors having to travel long distances.