Local Administrative Units Level 1 Boundaries for England and Wales, December 2015

Digital vector boundaries for Local Administrative Units Level 1 (LAU1) in England and Wales as of December 2015. The dataset contains five boundary versions, including full-resolution and four generalised versions clipped to the coastline. Contains both Ordnance Survey and Office for National Statistics Intellectual Property Rights.

Use Cases

• Create thematic maps of England and Wales based on the full-resolution administrative boundaries.
• Perform spatial joins with other datasets using the coastline-clipped boundaries.
• Optimize web map performance by using the super generalised (200m) or ultra generalised (500m) boundary files.
• Analyze coastal administrative units using the boundaries clipped to the Mean High Water mark.

Strengths

• Provides five distinct boundary versions for different use cases, from a 25 MB full-resolution file to a 225 KB ultra generalised file.
• Contains specific temporal coverage, representing boundaries as at December 2015.
• Includes both full-extent and coastline-clipped versions, offering flexibility for analysis.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Data is from 2015; administrative boundaries may have changed, limiting current applicability.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment for large-scale analysis.

Provenance

Source

Office for National Statistics

Collection Method

Likely digitized and maintained by national mapping and statistical agencies.

Time Range

December 2015

Freshness

Last updated 2026-07-08 13:32:35.973754; freshness should be verified.

Geography

England and Wales