Coastal Interbasins: Hydrological Units for Water Framework Directive Monitoring

Water Framework Directive legislation requires the definition of hydrological units for monitoring and management. Coastal interbasins are parcels of land between river bodies and coastal waters that were not classified as river water bodies. The dataset is provided by the Government Digital Service under an open government license.

Use Cases

• Delineate hydrological management units based on the Water Framework Directive legislation described.
• Analyze spatial relationships between river bodies and coastal/transitional waters based on the defined interbasin concept.
• Support environmental monitoring and reporting obligations for Northern Ireland's transposed WFD regulations.

Strengths

• Data is defined by specific EU and national legislation (Water Framework Directive and Northern Ireland Regulations).
• Available in multiple geospatial formats (KML, ESRI SHAPE, GEOJSON) for interoperability.

Limitations

• Row count and spatial extent are unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Last update date is unknown; freshness unverified.

Provenance

Source

Government Digital Service

Collection Method

Legislatively defined hydrological units for environmental monitoring.

Time Range

null

Freshness

unknown

Geography

Likely Northern Ireland, based on the referenced national legislation.