The TIGER/Line shapefiles and related database files (.dbf) are an extract of selected geographic and cartographic information from the U.S. Census Bureau's Master Address File / Topologically Integrated Geographic Encoding and Referencing (MAF/TIGER) Database (MTDB). The MTDB represents a seamless national file with no overlaps or gaps between parts, however, each TIGER/Line shapefile is designed to stand alone as an independent data set, or they can be combined to cover the entire nation. The primary legal divisions of most states are termed counties. In Louisiana, these divisions are known as parishes. In Alaska, which has no counties, the equivalent entities are the organized boroughs, city and boroughs, municipalities, and for the unorganized area, census areas. The latter are delineated cooperatively for statistical purposes by the State of Alaska and the Census Bureau. In four states (Maryland, Missouri, Nevada, and Virginia), there are one or more incorporated places that are independent of any county organization and thus constitute primary divisions of their states. These incorporated places are known as independent cities and are treated as equivalent entities for purposes of data presentation. The District of Columbia and Guam have no primary divisions, and each area is considered an equivalent entity for purposes of data presentation. The Census Bureau treats the following entities as equivalents of counties for purposes of data presentation: Municipios in Puerto Rico, Districts and Islands in American Samoa, Municipalities in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, and Islands in the U.S. Virgin Islands. The entire area of the United States, Puerto Rico, and the Island Areas is covered by counties or equivalent entities. The boundaries for counties and equivalent entities are as of January 1, 2017, primarily as reported through the Census Bureau's Boundary and Annexation Survey (BAS).

This dataset contains geographic information concerning cities and towns in the United States, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. A city or town is a place with a recorded population, usually with at least one central area that provides commercial activities. Cities are generally larger than towns; no distinction is made between cities and towns in this map layer.

Geospatial data about US Cities and Towns (Local). Export to CAD, GIS, PDF, CSV and access via API.

WARNING: This is a pre-release dataset and its fields names and data structures are subject to change. It should be considered pre-release until the end of 2024. Expected changes:

• Metadata is missing or incomplete for some layers at this time and will be continuously improved.
  
• We expect to update this layer roughly in line with CDTFA at some point, but will increase the update cadence over time as we are able to automate the final pieces of the process.

Purpose

County and incorporated place (city) boundaries along with third party identifiers used to join in external data. Boundaries are from the authoritative source the California Department of Tax and Fee Administration (CDTFA), altered to show the counties as one polygon. This layer displays the city polygons on top of the County polygons so the area isn"t interrupted. The GEOID attribute information is added from the US Census. GEOID is based on merged State and County FIPS codes for the Counties. Abbreviations for Counties and Cities were added from Caltrans Division of Local Assistance (DLA) data. Place Type was populated with information extracted from the Census. Names and IDs from the US Board on Geographic Names (BGN), the authoritative source of place names as published in the Geographic Name Information System (GNIS), are attached as well. Finally, the coastline is used to separate coastal buffers from the land-based portions of jurisdictions. This feature layer is for public use.

Related Layers

This dataset is part of a grouping of many datasets:

1. Cities: Only the city boundaries and attributes, without any unincorporated areas
   • With Coastal Buffers
   • Without Coastal Buffers
2. Counties: Full county boundaries and attributes, including all cities within as a single polygon
   • With Coastal Buffers
   • Without Coastal Buffers
3. Cities and Full Counties: A merge of the other two layers, so polygons overlap within city boundaries. Some customers require this behavior, so we provide it as a separate service.
   • With Coastal Buffers (this dataset)
   • Without Coastal Buffers
4. Place Abbreviations
5. Unincorporated Areas (Coming Soon)
6. Census Designated Places (Coming Soon)
   
7. Cartographic Coastline
   • Polygon
   • Line source (Coming Soon)

Point of Contact

California Department of Technology, Office of Digital Services, odsdataservices@state.ca.gov

Field and Abbreviation Definitions

• COPRI: county number followed by the 3-digit city primary number used in the Board of Equalization"s 6-digit tax rate area numbering system
• Place Name: CDTFA incorporated (city) or county name
• County: CDTFA county name. For counties, this will be the name of the polygon itself. For cities, it is the name of the county the city polygon is within.
• Legal Place Name: Board on Geographic Names authorized nomenclature for area names published in the Geographic Name Information System
• GNIS_ID: The numeric identifier from the Board on Geographic Names that can be used to join these boundaries to other datasets utilizing this identifier.
• GEOID: numeric geographic identifiers from the US Census Bureau Place Type: Board on Geographic Names authorized nomenclature for boundary type published in the Geographic Name Information System
• Place Abbr: CalTrans Division of Local Assistance abbreviations of incorporated area names
• CNTY Abbr: CalTrans Division of Local Assistance abbreviations of county names
• Area_SqMi: The area of the administrative unit (city or county) in square miles, calculated in EPSG 3310 California Teale Albers.
• COASTAL: Indicates if the polygon is a coastal buffer. Null for land polygons. Additional values include "ocean" and "bay".
• GlobalID: While all of the layers we provide in this dataset include a GlobalID field with unique values, we do not recommend you make any use of it. The GlobalID field exists to support offline sync, but is not persistent, so data keyed to it will be orphaned at our next update. Use one of the other persistent identifiers, such as GNIS_ID or GEOID instead.

Accuracy

CDTFA"s source data notes the following about accuracy:

City boundary changes and county boundary line adjustments filed with the Board of Equalization per Government Code 54900. This GIS layer contains the boundaries of the unincorporated county and incorporated cities within the state of California. The initial dataset was created in March of 2015 and was based on the State Board of Equalization tax rate area boundaries. As of April 1, 2024, the maintenance of this dataset is provided by the California Department of Tax and Fee Administration for the purpose of determining sales and use tax rates. The boundaries are continuously being revised to align with aerial imagery when areas of conflict are discovered between the original boundary provided by the California State Board of Equalization and the boundary made publicly available by local, state, and federal government. Some differences may occur between actual recorded boundaries and the boundaries used for sales and use tax purposes. The boundaries in this map are representations of taxing jurisdictions for the purpose of determining sales and use tax rates and should not be used to determine precise city or county boundary line locations. COUNTY = county name; CITY = city name or unincorporated

U.S. Counties - Generalized provides 2020 U.S. Census codes and population information, and generalized county (or county equivalent) boundaries to improve draw performance and be used effectively at a national level.

U.S. Counties - Generalized represents the counties (or county equivalents) of the United States in the 50 states and the District of Columbia. U.S. Counties - Generalized are polygons containing population totals from the 2020 Census.The TIGER/Line shapefiles and related database files (.dbf) are an extract of selected geographic and cartographic information from the U.S. Census Bureau's Master Address File / Topologically Integrated Geographic Encoding and Referencing (MAF/TIGER) Database (MTDB). The MTDB represents a seamless national file with no overlaps or gaps between parts, however, each TIGER/Line shapefile is designed to stand alone as an independent data set, or they can be combined to cover the entire nation.The primary legal divisions of most states are termed counties. In Louisiana, these divisions are known as parishes. In Alaska, which has no counties, the equivalent entities are the organized boroughs, city and boroughs, municipalities, and for the unorganized area, census areas. The latter are delineated cooperatively for statistical purposes by the State of Alaska and the Census Bureau. In four states (Maryland, Missouri, Nevada, and Virginia), there are one or more incorporated places that are independent of any county organization and thus constitute primary divisions of their states. These incorporated places are known as independent cities and are treated as equivalent entities for purposes of data presentation. The District of Columbia and Guam have no primary divisions, and each area is considered an equivalent entity for purposes of data presentation. The Census Bureau treats the following entities as equivalents of counties for purposes of data presentation: Municipios in Puerto Rico, Districts and Islands in American Samoa, Municipalities in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, and Islands in the U.S. Virgin Islands. The entire area of the United States, Puerto Rico, and the Island Areas is covered by counties or equivalent entities.The boundaries for counties and equivalent entities are as of January 1, 2019, primarily as reported through the Census Bureau's Boundary and Annexation Survey (BAS).

This data set includes cities in the United States, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. These cities were collected from the 1970 National Atlas of the United States. Where applicable, U.S. Census Bureau codes for named populated places were associated with each name to allow additional information to be attached. The Geographic Names Information System (GNIS) was also used as a source for additional information. This is a revised version of the December, 2003, data set.

This layer is sourced from maps.bts.dot.gov.

The TIGER/Line shapefiles and related database files (.dbf) are an extract of selected geographic and cartographic information from the U.S. Census Bureau's Master Address File / Topologically Integrated Geographic Encoding and Referencing (MAF/TIGER) Database (MTDB). The MTDB represents a seamless national file with no overlaps or gaps between parts, however, each TIGER/Line shapefile is designed to stand alone as an independent data set, or they can be combined to cover the entire nation. The primary legal divisions of most states are termed counties. In Louisiana, these divisions are known as parishes. In Alaska, which has no counties, the equivalent entities are the organized boroughs, city and boroughs, municipalities, and for the unorganized area, census areas. The latter are delineated cooperatively for statistical purposes by the State of Alaska and the Census Bureau. In four states (Maryland, Missouri, Nevada, and Virginia), there are one or more incorporated places that are independent of any county organization and thus constitute primary divisions of their states. These incorporated places are known as independent cities and are treated as equivalent entities for purposes of data presentation. The District of Columbia and Guam have no primary divisions, and each area is considered an equivalent entity for purposes of data presentation. The Census Bureau treats the following entities as equivalents of counties for purposes of data presentationMunicipios in Puerto Rico, Districts and Islands in American Samoa, Municipalities in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, and Islands in the U.S. Virgin Islands. The entire area of the United States, Puerto Rico, and the Island Areas is covered by counties or equivalent entities. The boundaries for counties and equivalent entities are mostly as of January 1, 2013, primarily as reported through the Census Bureau's Boundary and Annexation Survey (BAS). However, some changes made after January 2013, including the addition and deletion of counties, are included.

The 2022 cartographic boundary shapefiles are simplified representations of selected geographic areas from the U.S. Census Bureau's Master Address File / Topologically Integrated Geographic Encoding and Referencing (MAF/TIGER) Database (MTDB). These boundary files are specifically designed for small-scale thematic mapping. When possible, generalization is performed with the intent to maintain the hierarchical relationships among geographies and to maintain the alignment of geographies within a file set for a given year. Geographic areas may not align with the same areas from another year. Some geographies are available as nation-based files while others are available only as state-based files. The primary legal divisions of most states are termed counties. In Louisiana, these divisions are known as parishes. In Alaska, which has no counties, the equivalent entities are the organized boroughs, city and boroughs, municipalities, and for the unorganized area, census areas. The latter are delineated cooperatively for statistical purposes by the State of Alaska and the Census Bureau. In four states (Maryland, Missouri, Nevada, and Virginia), there are one or more incorporated places that are independent of any county organization and thus constitute primary divisions of their states. These incorporated places are known as independent cities and are treated as equivalent entities for purposes of data presentation. The District of Columbia and Guam have no primary divisions, and each area is considered an equivalent entity for purposes of data presentation. The Census Bureau treats the following entities as equivalents of counties for purposes of data presentation: Municipios in Puerto Rico, Districts and Islands in American Samoa, Municipalities in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, and Islands in the U.S. Virgin Islands. The entire area of the United States, Puerto Rico, and the Island Areas is covered by counties or equivalent entities. The generalized boundaries for counties and equivalent entities are based on those as of January 1, 2022, primarily as reported through the Census Bureau's Boundary and Annexation Survey (BAS).

This map layer includes cities and towns in the United States, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. A city or town is a place with a recorded population, usually with at least one central area that provides commercial activities. Cities are generally larger than towns; no distinction is made between cities and towns in this map layer.

This layer is a component of Populated Places.

This map layer includes cities and towns in the United States, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands (NTAD 2015). A city or town is a place with a recorded population, usually with at least one central area that provides commercial activities. Cities are generally larger than towns; no distinction is made between cities and towns in this map layer.

© The National Atlas

Link to the ScienceBase Item Summary page for the item described by this metadata record. Service Protocol: Link to the ScienceBase Item Summary page for the item described by this metadata record. Application Profile: Web Browser. Link Function: information

WARNING: This is a pre-release dataset and its fields names and data structures are subject to change. It should be considered pre-release until the end of March 2025. The schema changed in February 2025 - please see below. We will post a roadmap of upcoming changes, but service URLs and schema are now stable. For deployment status of new services in February 2025, see https://gis.data.ca.gov/pages/city-and-county-boundary-data-status. Additional roadmap and status links at the bottom of this metadata.This dataset is continuously updated as the source data from CDTFA is updated, as often as many times a month. If you require unchanging point-in-time data, export a copy for your own use rather than using the service directly in your applications.PurposeCity boundaries along with third party identifiers used to join in external data. Boundaries are from the California Department of Tax and Fee Administration (CDTFA). These boundaries are the best available statewide data source in that CDTFA receives changes in incorporation and boundary lines from the Board of Equalization, who receives them from local jurisdictions for tax purposes. Boundary accuracy is not guaranteed, and though CDTFA works to align boundaries based on historical records and local changes, errors will exist. If you require a legal assessment of boundary location, contact a licensed surveyor.This dataset joins in multiple attributes and identifiers from the US Census Bureau and Board on Geographic Names to facilitate adding additional third party data sources. In addition, we attach attributes of our own to ease and reduce common processing needs and questions. Finally, coastal buffers are separated into separate polygons, leaving the land-based portions of jurisdictions and coastal buffers in adjacent polygons. This feature layer is for public use.Related LayersThis dataset is part of a grouping of many datasets:Cities: Only the city boundaries and attributes, without any unincorporated areasWith Coastal BuffersWithout Coastal Buffers (this dataset)Counties: Full county boundaries and attributes, including all cities within as a single polygonWith Coastal BuffersWithout Coastal BuffersCities and Full Counties: A merge of the other two layers, so polygons overlap within city boundaries. Some customers require this behavior, so we provide it as a separate service.With Coastal BuffersWithout Coastal BuffersCity and County AbbreviationsUnincorporated Areas (Coming Soon)Census Designated PlacesCartographic CoastlinePolygonLine source (Coming Soon)Working with Coastal BuffersThe dataset you are currently viewing excludes the coastal buffers for cities and counties that have them in the source data from CDTFA. In the versions where they are included, they remain as a second polygon on cities or counties that have them, with all the same identifiers, and a value in the COASTAL field indicating if it"s an ocean or a bay buffer. If you wish to have a single polygon per jurisdiction that includes the coastal buffers, you can run a Dissolve on the version that has the coastal buffers on all the fields except OFFSHORE and AREA_SQMI to get a version with the correct identifiers.Point of ContactCalifornia Department of Technology, Office of Digital Services, odsdataservices@state.ca.govField and Abbreviation DefinitionsCDTFA_CITY: CDTFA incorporated city nameCDTFA_COUNTY: CDTFA county name. For counties, this will be the name of the polygon itself. For cities, it is the name of the county the city polygon is within.CDTFA_COPRI: county number followed by the 3-digit city primary number used in the Board of Equalization"s 6-digit tax rate area numbering system. The boundary data originate with CDTFA's teams managing tax rate information, so this field is preserved and flows into this dataset.CENSUS_GEOID: numeric geographic identifiers from the US Census BureauCENSUS_PLACE_TYPE: City, County, or Town, stripped off the census name for identification purpose.GNIS_PLACE_NAME: Board on Geographic Names authorized nomenclature for area names published in the Geographic Name Information SystemGNIS_ID: The numeric identifier from the Board on Geographic Names that can be used to join these boundaries to other datasets utilizing this identifier.CDT_CITY_ABBR: Abbreviations of incorporated area names - originally derived from CalTrans Division of Local Assistance and now managed by CDT. Abbreviations are 4 characters. Not present in the county-specific layers.CDT_COUNTY_ABBR: Abbreviations of county names - originally derived from CalTrans Division of Local Assistance and now managed by CDT. Abbreviations are 3 characters.CDT_NAME_SHORT: The name of the jurisdiction (city or county) with the word "City" or "County" stripped off the end. Some changes may come to how we process this value to make it more consistent.AREA_SQMI: The area of the administrative unit (city or county) in square miles, calculated in EPSG 3310 California Teale Albers.OFFSHORE: Indicates if the polygon is a coastal buffer. Null for land polygons. Additional values include "ocean" and "bay".PRIMARY_DOMAIN: Currently empty/null for all records. Placeholder field for official URL of the city or countyCENSUS_POPULATION: Currently null for all records. In the future, it will include the most recent US Census population estimate for the jurisdiction.GlobalID: While all of the layers we provide in this dataset include a GlobalID field with unique values, we do not recommend you make any use of it. The GlobalID field exists to support offline sync, but is not persistent, so data keyed to it will be orphaned at our next update. Use one of the other persistent identifiers, such as GNIS_ID or GEOID instead.Boundary AccuracyCounty boundaries were originally derived from a 1:24,000 accuracy dataset, with improvements made in some places to boundary alignments based on research into historical records and boundary changes as CDTFA learns of them. City boundary data are derived from pre-GIS tax maps, digitized at BOE and CDTFA, with adjustments made directly in GIS for new annexations, detachments, and corrections. Boundary accuracy within the dataset varies. While CDTFA strives to correctly include or exclude parcels from jurisdictions for accurate tax assessment, this dataset does not guarantee that a parcel is placed in the correct jurisdiction. When a parcel is in the correct jurisdiction, this dataset cannot guarantee accurate placement of boundary lines within or between parcels or rights of way. This dataset also provides no information on parcel boundaries. For exact jurisdictional or parcel boundary locations, please consult the county assessor's office and a licensed surveyor.CDTFA's data is used as the best available source because BOE and CDTFA receive information about changes in jurisdictions which otherwise need to be collected independently by an agency or company to compile into usable map boundaries. CDTFA maintains the best available statewide boundary information.CDTFA's source data notes the following about accuracy:City boundary changes and county boundary line adjustments filed with the Board of Equalization per Government Code 54900. This GIS layer contains the boundaries of the unincorporated county and incorporated cities within the state of California. The initial dataset was created in March of 2015 and was based on the State Board of Equalization tax rate area boundaries. As of April 1, 2024, the maintenance of this dataset is provided by the California Department of Tax and Fee Administration for the purpose of determining sales and use tax rates. The boundaries are continuously being revised to align with aerial imagery when areas of conflict are discovered between the original boundary provided by the California State Board of Equalization and the boundary made publicly available by local, state, and federal government. Some differences may occur between actual recorded boundaries and the boundaries used for sales and use tax purposes. The boundaries in this map are representations of taxing jurisdictions for the purpose of determining sales and use tax rates and should not be used to determine precise city or county boundary line locations. Boundary ProcessingThese data make a structural change from the source data. While the full boundaries provided by CDTFA include coastal buffers of varying sizes, many users need boundaries to end at the shoreline of the ocean or a bay. As a result, after examining existing city and county boundary layers, these datasets provide a coastline cut generally along the ocean facing coastline. For county boundaries in northern California, the cut runs near the Golden Gate Bridge, while for cities, we cut along the bay shoreline and into the edge of the Delta at the boundaries of Solano, Contra Costa, and Sacramento counties.In the services linked above, the versions that include the coastal buffers contain them as a second (or third) polygon for the city or county, with the value in the COASTAL field set to whether it"s a bay or ocean polygon. These can be processed back into a single polygon by dissolving on all the fields you wish to keep, since the attributes, other than the COASTAL field and geometry attributes (like areas) remain the same between the polygons for this purpose.SliversIn cases where a city or county"s boundary ends near a coastline, our coastline data may cross back and forth many times while roughly paralleling the jurisdiction"s boundary, resulting in many polygon slivers. We post-process the data to remove these slivers using a city/county boundary priority algorithm. That is, when the data run parallel to each other, we discard the coastline cut and keep the CDTFA-provided boundary, even if it extends into the ocean a small amount. This processing supports consistent boundaries for Fort Bragg, Point Arena, San

The 2020 cartographic boundary shapefiles are simplified representations of selected geographic areas from the U.S. Census Bureau's Master Address File / Topologically Integrated Geographic Encoding and Referencing (MAF/TIGER) Database (MTDB). These boundary files are specifically designed for small-scale thematic mapping. When possible, generalization is performed with the intent to maintain the hierarchical relationships among geographies and to maintain the alignment of geographies within a file set for a given year. Geographic areas may not align with the same areas from another year. Some geographies are available as nation-based files while others are available only as state-based files. The records in this file allow users to map the parts of the 116th Congressional Districts that overlap a particular county. Congressional Districts are the 435 areas from which people are elected to the U.S. House of Representatives. After the apportionment of congressional seats among the states based on census population counts, each state is responsible for establishing congressional districts for the purpose of electing representatives. Each congressional district is to be as equal in population to all other congressional districts in a state as practicable. The 116th Congress is seated from January 2019 to 2021. The cartographic boundary files for the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and the Island Areas (American Samoa, Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, and the U.S. Virgin Islands) each contain a single record for the non-voting delegate district in these areas. The boundaries of all other congressional districts reflect information provided to the Census Bureau by the states by May 1, 2018. The primary legal divisions of most states are termed counties. In Louisiana, these divisions are known as parishes. In Alaska, which has no counties, the equivalent entities are the organized boroughs, city and boroughs, municipalities, and for the unorganized area, census areas. The latter are delineated cooperatively for statistical purposes by the state of Alaska and the Census Bureau. In four states (Maryland, Missouri, Nevada, and Virginia), there are one or more incorporated places that are independent of any county organization and thus constitute primary divisions of their states. These incorporated places are known as independent cities and are treated as equivalent entities for purposes of data presentation. The District of Columbia and Guam have no primary divisions, and each area is considered an equivalent entity for purposes of data presentation. The Census Bureau treats the following entities as equivalents of counties for purposes of data presentation: Municipios in Puerto Rico, Districts and Islands in American Samoa, Municipalities in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, and Islands in the U.S. Virgin Islands. The entire area of the United States, Puerto Rico, and the Island Areas is covered by counties or equivalent entities. The boundaries for counties and equivalent entities are mostly as of January 1, 2020, primarily as reported through the Census Bureau's Boundary and Annexation Survey (BAS).

Cartographic Boundary Map provided the State of Texas Open Data Portal here: https://data.texas.gov/dataset/Texas-Counties-Cartographic-Boundary-Map/sw7f-2kkd/about_data

Terms of Use This product is for informational purposes and may not have been prepared for or be suitable for legal, engineering, or surveying purposes. It does not represent an on-the-ground survey and represents only the approximate relative location of property boundaries. This product has been provided by the City of Austin via the US Census Bureau for the sole purpose of geographic reference. No warranty is made by the City of Austin regarding specific accuracy or completeness.

WARNING: This is a pre-release dataset and its fields names and data structures are subject to change. It should be considered pre-release until the end of March 2025. The schema changed in February 2025 - please see below. We will post a roadmap of upcoming changes, but service URLs and schema are now stable. For deployment status of new services in February 2025, see https://gis.data.ca.gov/pages/city-and-county-boundary-data-status. Additional roadmap and status links at the bottom of this metadata.

Purpose

County boundaries along with third party identifiers used to join in external data. Boundaries are from the California Department of Tax and Fee Administration (CDTFA). These boundaries are the best available statewide data source in that CDTFA receives changes in incorporation and boundary lines from the Board of Equalization, who receives them from local jurisdictions for tax purposes. Boundary accuracy is not guaranteed, and though CDTFA works to align boundaries based on historical records and local changes, errors will exist. If you require a legal assessment of boundary location, contact a licensed surveyor.

This dataset joins in multiple attributes and identifiers from the US Census Bureau and Board on Geographic Names to facilitate adding additional third party data sources. In addition, we attach attributes of our own to ease and reduce common processing needs and questions. Finally, coastal buffers are separated into separate polygons, leaving the land-based portions of jurisdictions and coastal buffers in adjacent polygons. This layer removes the coastal buffer polygons. This feature layer is for public use.

Related Layers

This dataset is part of a grouping of many datasets:

1. Cities: Only the city boundaries and attributes, without any unincorporated areas
   • With Coastal Buffers
   • Without Coastal Buffers
2. Counties: Full county boundaries and attributes, including all cities within as a single polygon
   • With Coastal Buffers
   • Without Coastal Buffers (this dataset)
3. Cities and Full Counties: A merge of the other two layers, so polygons overlap within city boundaries. Some customers require this behavior, so we provide it as a separate service.
   • With Coastal Buffers
   • Without Coastal Buffers
4. City and County Abbreviations
5. Unincorporated Areas (Coming Soon)
6. Census Designated Places
7. Cartographic Coastline
   • Polygon
   • Line source (Coming Soon)

Point of Contact

California Department of Technology, Office of Digital Services, odsdataservices@state.ca.gov

Field and Abbreviation Definitions

• CDTFA_COUNTY: CDTFA county name. For counties, this will be the name of the polygon itself. For cities, it is the name of the county the city polygon is within.
• CDTFA_COPRI: county number followed by the 3-digit city primary number used in the Board of Equalization"s 6-digit tax rate area numbering system. The boundary data originate with CDTFA's teams managing tax rate information, so this field is preserved and flows into this dataset.
• CENSUS_GEOID: numeric geographic identifiers from the US Census Bureau
• CENSUS_PLACE_TYPE: City, County, or Town, stripped off the census name for identification purpose.
• GNIS_PLACE_NAME: Board on Geographic Names authorized nomenclature for area names published in the Geographic Name Information System
• GNIS_ID: The numeric identifier from the Board on Geographic Names that can be used to join these boundaries to other datasets utilizing this identifier.
• CDT_COUNTY_ABBR: Abbreviations of county names - originally derived from CalTrans Division of Local Assistance and now managed by CDT. Abbreviations are 3 characters.
• CDT_NAME_SHORT: The name of the jurisdiction (city or county) with the word "City" or "County" stripped off the end. Some changes may come to how we process this value to make it more consistent.
• AREA_SQMI: The area of the administrative unit (city or county) in square miles, calculated in EPSG 3310 California Teale Albers.
• OFFSHORE: Indicates if the polygon is a coastal buffer. Null for land polygons. Additional values include "ocean" and "bay".
• PRIMARY_DOMAIN: Currently empty/null for all records. Placeholder field for official URL of the city or county
• CENSUS_POPULATION: Currently null for all records. In the future, it will include the most recent US Census population estimate for the jurisdiction.
• GlobalID: While all of the layers we provide in this dataset include a GlobalID field with unique values, we do not recommend you make any use of it. The GlobalID field exists to support offline sync, but is not persistent, so data keyed to it will be orphaned at our next update. Use one of the other persistent identifiers, such as GNIS_ID or GEOID instead.

Northeastern United States Town Boundary data are intended for geographic display of state, county and town (municipal) boundaries at statewide and regional levels. Use it to map and label towns on a map. These data are derived from Northeastern United States Political Boundary Master layer. This information should be displayed and analyzed at scales appropriate for 1:24,000-scale data. The State of Connecticut, Department of Environmental Protection (CTDEP) assembled this regional data layer using data from other states in order to create a single, seamless representation of political boundaries within the vicinity of Connecticut that could be easily incorporated into mapping applications as background information. More accurate and up-to-date information may be available from individual State government Geographic Information System (GIS) offices. Not intended for maps printed at map scales greater or more detailed than 1:24,000 scale (1 inch = 2,000 feet.)

This dataset is part of the Geographical repository maintained by Opendatasoft. This dataset contains data for places and equivalent entities in United States of America.This layer both incorporated places (legal entities) and census designated places or CDPs (statistical entities). An incorporated place is established to provide governmental functions for a concentration of people as opposed to a minor civil division (MCD), which generally is created to provide services or administer an area without regard, necessarily, to population. Places always nest within a state, but may extend across county and county subdivision boundaries. An incorporated place usually is a city, town, village, or borough, but can have other legal descriptions. CDPs are delineated for the decennial census as the statistical counterparts of incorporated places. CDPs are delineated to provide data for settled concentrations of population that are identifiable by name, but are not legally incorporated under the laws of the state in which they are located. The boundaries for CDPs often are defined in partnership with state, local, and/or tribal officials and usually coincide with visible features or the boundary of an adjacent incorporated place or another legal entity. CDP boundaries often change from one decennial census to the next with changes in the settlement pattern and development; a CDP with the same name as in an earlier census does not necessarily have the same boundary. The only population/housing size requirement for CDPs is that they must contain some housing and population. Processors and tools are using this data. Enhancements Add ISO 3166-3 codes. Simplify geometries to provide better performance across the services. Add administrative hierarchy.

U.S. Census BlocksThis feature layer, utilizing National Geospatial Data Asset (NGDA) data from the U.S. Census Bureau (USCB), displays Census Blocks in the United States. A brief description of Census Blocks, per USCB, is that "Census blocks are statistical areas bounded by visible features such as roads, streams, and railroad tracks, and by nonvisible boundaries such as property lines, city, township, school district, county limits and short line-of-sight extensions of roads." Also, "the smallest level of geography you can get basic demographic data for, such as total population by age, sex, and race."Census Block 1007Data currency: This cached Esri federal service is checked weekly for updates from its enterprise federal source (Census Blocks) and will support mapping, analysis, data exports and OGC API – Feature access.NGDAID: 69 (Series Information for 2020 Census Block State-based TIGER/Line Shapefiles, Current)OGC API Features Link: (U.S. Census Blocks - OGC Features) copy this link to embed it in OGC Compliant viewersFor more information, please visit: What are census blocksFor feedback please contact: Esri_US_Federal_Data@esri.comNGDA Data SetThis data set is part of the NGDA Governmental Units, and Administrative and Statistical Boundaries Theme Community. Per the Federal Geospatial Data Committee (FGDC), this theme is defined as the "boundaries that delineate geographic areas for uses such as governance and the general provision of services (e.g., states, American Indian reservations, counties, cities, towns, etc.), administration and/or for a specific purpose (e.g., congressional districts, school districts, fire districts, Alaska Native Regional Corporations, etc.), and/or provision of statistical data (census tracts, census blocks, metropolitan and micropolitan statistical areas, etc.). Boundaries for these various types of geographic areas are either defined through a documented legal description or through criteria and guidelines. Other boundaries may include international limits, those of federal land ownership, the extent of administrative regions for various federal agencies, as well as the jurisdictional offshore limits of U.S. sovereignty. Boundaries associated solely with natural resources and/or cultural entities are excluded from this theme and are included in the appropriate subject themes."For other NGDA Content: Esri Federal Datasets

This dataset contains shapefile boundaries for CA State, counties and places from the US Census Bureau's 2023 MAF/TIGER database. Current geography in the 2023 TIGER/Line Shapefiles generally reflects the boundaries of governmental units in effect as of January 1, 2023.

Incorporated Places (cities and towns) are those reported to the Census Bureau as legally in existence as of May 28, 2021, under the laws of their respective states. Features were extracted from California 2020 TIGER/Line shapefile by the Metropolitan Transportation Commission. An incorporated place provides governmental functions for a concentration of people, as opposed to a minor civil division, which generally provides services or administers an area without regard, necessarily, to population. Places may extend across county and county subdivision boundaries, but never across state boundaries. An incorporated place usually is a city, town, village, or borough, but can have other legal descriptions.

This map of Minnesota cities, townships, and counties was published by MnGeo in January 2019. The primary data set for the map is the "Cities, Townships, and Unorganized Territories" (MnCTU) data maintained by the Minnesota Department of Transportation. Other reference data on the map include County Seats and Other Cities, County Boundaries, Interstate, US Trunk, and State Trunk Highways, Major Rivers, Lakes, County and State Boundaries. The download is a PDF file with embedded layers that can be printed at E-scale (36" x 48").