INSPIRE Geoportal
Administrative Units of Spain
Municipal, provincial and autonomous areas and municipal, provincial and Autonomous Community boundaries registered in the Central Register of Cartography ( https://www.ign.es/web/en/ign/portal/rcc-area-rcc). The geometry reflects the interpretation of the legal titles included in the Central Register of Cartography: limit line minutes, administrative rulings, court rulings etc. may be ‘provisional’, i.e. they do not have a legal title to support their geometry and therefore their representation in the cartography is only due to the topological necessity of the closure of municipal polygons. Royal Decree 1545/2007, of 23 November, governing the National Mapping System, establishes the functions of Central Register of Cartography to record the official cartography, the territorial delineations and their variations, and to collect, standardise and disseminate the official mapping. Article 20 of this Royal Decree states that the municipal boundaries, the boundaries of the provinces and the boundaries of the territories of the Autonomous Communities are part of the territorial restrictions and must therefore be entered in the Central Mapping Register. In addition, Article 4 (1) of the aforementioned Royal Decree provides that ‘all production of official geographical information and mapping shall be carried out using the National Geographic Reference Chart, which shall be composed of (...); by the territorial limitations registered in the Central Mapping Register (...)’, that is to say, the territorial delineations used in the official cartography must be those listed in the Central Register of Cartography. It should be noted that, as a general rule, the geometry with which each line is listed in the Central Register of Cartography has a geometrical uncertainty of around 40 metres, based on the experience and contrast with specific one-off work carried out by the Geographic Institute on a large number of borderline lines. This is the result of inaccuracies in the topographical methods and instruments used at the time by the Geographic Institute for lifting and subsequent mapping on the national topographic map, which should be added to the processes of digitisation of those lines on printed cartography, carried out after years to obtain their digital version. The exception to this is those where a series of technical and administrative work has been carried out as required by the national or Autonomous Community legislation in force for the demarcation of municipal terms in force, allowing for the registration of a more precise geometry.
Simple
- Date (Creation)
- 2012-01-01
- Date (Publication)
- 2020-01-01
- Date (Revision)
- 2024-11-01
- Citation identifier
- IGN / BDLJE
- Citation identifier
- IGN / bdlje_limites_adm
- Citation identifier
- IGN / bdlje_unidades_adm
- Citation identifier
- IGN / bdlje_limites_hist
- Point of contact
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Organisation name Individual name Electronic mail address Role Spanish National Geographic Institute
Owner National Centre of Geographic Information (CNIG)
Publisher
- Maintenance and update frequency
- Quarterly
- Update scope
- Dataset
- Maintenance note
-
Actualización trimestral
- Keywords
- Keywords
-
-
IGN
-
Líneas Límite
-
- Specific usage
-
In the general case (approximately 85% in 2024) the boundary lines registered in the Central Mapping Registry have geometric uncertainty corresponding to a range of scales between 1:25,000 and 1:100. 000, due to the precision of the topographic methods and instruments used at the time by the National Geographic Institute for their survey and subsequent drawing on the National Topographic Map (MTN), and also due to the successive analogue copies from one edition to another of the MTN and the processes of digitising these limit lines on printed cartography, carried out years later to obtain their digital version.
- User contact info
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Organisation name Individual name Electronic mail address Role Spanish National Geographic Institute
Author
- Access constraints
- Other restrictions
- Other constraints
- Sin limitaciones al acceso público.
- Use constraints
- Other restrictions
- Other constraints
- No se aplican condiciones de acceso y uso.
- Other constraints
- BDLJE CC-BY 4.0 ign.es
- Spatial representation type
- Vector
- Denominator
- 25000
- Language
- Spanish; Castilian
- Language
- Catalan; Valencian
- Language
- baq
- Language
- glg
- Character set
- UTF8
- Topic category
-
- Boundaries
- Description
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Península Ibérica, Illes Balears, Canarias, Ceuta y Melilla
))
- Unique resource identifier
- ETRS89 en la Península, Illes Balears, Ceuta y Melilla. Coordenadas geográficas longitud y latitud.
- Unique resource identifier
- REGCAN95 en Canarias. Coordenadas geográficas longitud y latitud.
- Distribution format
-
Name Version Shapefile (.shp) Desconocida
GML a través de servicio WFS y ATOM 4.0
geo+json a través de API Features 1.0.2
Distributor
- Distributor contact
-
Organisation name Individual name Electronic mail address Role National Centre of Geographic Information (CNIG)
Distributor
- Fees
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Free download through the CNIG's download centre or through network services of INSPIRE Directive (WFS, ATOM Feed, API Features)
- Units of distribution
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The whole Spain
- OnLine resource
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Protocol Linkage Name OGC Web Map Service https://www.ign.es/wms-inspire/unidades-administrativas?REQUEST=GetCapabilities&SERVICE=WMS&VERSION=1.3.0 View Services (WMS) for the Administrative Units of Spain
OGC Web Feature Service http://www.ign.es/wfs-inspire/unidades-administrativas?request=GetCapabilities&service=WFS&version=2.0.0 Download service (WFS) for Administrative Units of Spain
The Atom Syndication Format https://www.ign.es/atom/dataset_feeds/lin_lim_mun.es.xml Download service (ATOM Feed) for Administrative Units of Spain
OGC API-Features https://api-features.ign.es/collections/administrativeboundary API for downloading administrative boundary (API-Features)
OGC API-Features https://api-features.ign.es/collections/administrativeunit API for downloading administrative unit (API-Features)
File for download https://centrodedescargas.cnig.es/CentroDescargas/buscadorCatalogo.do?codFamilia=LILIM Free download through the CNIG's download centre
- Hierarchy level
- Dataset
Conformance result
Conformance result
- Statement
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The origin of the data that make up these geometries is very heterogeneous, so that the accuracy of the limit lines ranges from decimeter to decameter. The boundary lines registered in the most accurate Central Register of Cartography come from administrative decisions or court rulings establishing the line accurately or from specific work to improve the boundary line. This work consists of locating the boundary markers which determine the line, setting out those which have disappeared from the legal and technical documentation registered (normally the boundary markers, field topographical notebook and municipal planimetries), assigning precise coordinates to the markers and the line between two consecutive markers (if it is not a straight line) and the subsequent legal endorsement of the result of the work. The majority of the boundary lines inscribed have a decametric precision, a consequence of the precision of the topographic methods and instruments used at the time by the Geographic Institute for their survey and subsequent drawing on the National Topographic Map, to which must be added those of the digitalisation processes of these boundary lines on printed cartography. In general, this geometry has the precision of the 1/25,000 scale and therefore can not be used for the representation of jurisdictional limits in larger scale cartography (smaller denominator)
Metadata
- File identifier
- spaignLLM XML
- Metadata language
- Spanish; Castilian
- Character set
- UTF8
- Hierarchy level
- Dataset
- Date stamp
- 2025-02-14
- Metadata standard name
-
INSPIRE Regulation Nº1205/2008
- Metadata standard version
-
TG 2.0
- Metadata author
-
Organisation name Individual name Electronic mail address Role Spanish National Geographic Institute
Point of contact
- Other language
-
Language Character encoding English UTF8
