GfK has released its Europe Map Edition 2017/2018, which includes thousands of updates to the previous year’s edition. The digital maps reveal Europe’s current administrative and postcode boundaries. As such, they provide the basis for carrying out accurate geographic analyses in geomarketing software and BI systems.

GfK’s new Europe Edition includes approximately 1,000 digital maps. These reflect the latest regional status and feature numerous new details and regional levels. The new maps also offer more granularity, particularly along coastlines and in cities. The maps provide comprehensive coverage down to Europe’s most detailed postcode and administrative levels, which correspond to the five-digit postcodes and municipalities, respectively. Also available is new 2017 market data on European purchasing power as well as inhabitants and households. Both the maps and market data are available immediately.

The updated maps reflect demographic, economic and political changes in each of the included European countries. These changes pose challenges to government and postal organizations that require comprehensive coverage for delivering services to inhabitants in a given country. The new maps feature updated coverage of the hundreds of regions such as municipalities and postcodes that have changed since the last update. This allows the aforementioned organizations to manage and plan their coverage areas with greater accuracy and efficiency.

“A precise, up-to-date cartographic basis is a prerequisite for successfully carrying out regional market analyses,” says Klaus Dittmann, head of cartography at GfK’s Geomarketing solution area. “Our new Europe Edition includes updated maps for all of Europe. This gives companies from all industries a reliable basis for geographic analyses of their markets and operations.”

Outdated postcode boundaries are problematic, because these are the means by which address-based company and market data is linked to and visualized on digital maps. For example, if the postcode of a company site changes, any turnover generated by this site would be attributed to the wrong postcode if the underlying postcode boundaries are incorrect or outdated.

New additions
There are many new additions to the Europe Edition 2017/2018 due to changes to the postal and administrative levels in every European country. This year’s update includes thousands of adjustments to reflect these changes. Some of the more comprehensive changes are indicated on a country-by-country basis below:

Bulgaria

• 4-digit postcodes: 18 dissolved and 11 new, 708 name changes, 3 boundary changes

France

• municipalities: 470 dissolved and one new

Great Britain
The maps of the postcode units (most detailed postcode level for Great Britain) and the postcode unit points (middle points of the postcode units) have been newly rendered on the basis of the most up-to-date sources.

• postcode units: 5,336 new
• postcode unit points: 23,006 new

Ireland
The map set for Ireland now also includes a map of the country’s 139 3-digit postcodes.

Italy

• municipalities: 20 dissolved and 10 new, 155 ID changes
• 5-digit postcodes: 3 dissolved and 3 new, 10 boundary changes

Croatia

• 5-digit postcodes: 24 dissolved and 2 new

Luxembourg

• 4-digit postcodes: 32 new

Macedonia
For the first time, the map set for Macedonia includes a map of the country’s 228 4-digit postcodes.

Netherlands
The administrative and postcode boundaries have been newly rendered on the basis of official vector data. Postcode boundaries are now accurate at the level of individual houses, and the country’s coastline is more detailed. The map set for the Netherlands now includes two new maps: a map of the country’s 12,820 “buurten” (neighborhoods) and a map of the country’s 456,714 6-digit postcodes.

• municipalities: 3 dissolved and one new, one boundary change

Norway
The administrative and postcode boundaries were newly rendered on the basis of official vector data. Postcode boundaries are now accurate at the level of individual houses, and the country’s coastline is more detailed. The map set for Norway now also includes maps of the country’s 1,552 “delområde” (tracts) and 14,052 “grunnkretser” (units).

• municipalities: 3 dissolved and one new
• 4-digit postcodes: 2 dissolved and 56 new

Poland
The administrative and postcode boundaries were newly rendered on the basis of official vector data. Postcode boundaries for Warsaw, Krakow, Łódź, Wrocław, Poznań, Gdansk, Gdynia and Sopot are now accurate at the level of individual houses.

• sub-municipalities: 6 dissolved and 11 new, 3 boundary changes
• 5-digit postcodes: 55 dissolved and 43 new

Austria
The map set for Austria now includes a map of the country’s 8,825 enumeration districts, which comprise Austria’s most detailed statistical level. The administrative and postcode boundaries were also newly rendered on the basis of official vector data. Postcode boundaries are now accurate at the level of individual houses.

• municipalities: 21 ID changes, 2 name changes, 3 boundary corrections
• 4-digit postcodes: 2 dissolved and one new, 25 boundary changes, 2 boundary corrections

Sweden

• 5-digit postcodes: 31 dissolved and 74 new, 25 boundary changes

Czech Republic

• municipalities: 5 name corrections, 60 boundary changes
• districts: 2 name corrections, 10 boundary changes
• 5-digit postcodes: 90 dissolved and 39 new, 42 name changes, 240 boundary changes

Turkey

• 5-digit postcodes: 72 dissolved and 104 new, 35 boundary changes/corrections

Ukraine
The map set for the Ukraine includes a new map that combines the maps of the country’s three- and five-digit postcodes. This involved integrating the five-digit postcodes for the cities of Kiev, Charkiw and Dnipro into the map of the three-digit postcodes. The resulting map offers complete coverage of the country.

NUTS regions: version 2016 (new system as of 01.01.2018)
The Nomenclature of Units for Territorial Statistics (NUTS) was created by Eurostat to provide a unified classification of regional units for the compilation of regional statistics for the European Union. This standard is updated in intervals every three-to-four years to reflect regional administrative changes.

• new NUTS3 structure in France, Lithuania and Ireland, and partially new structure in Germany, Finland, Hungary, Poland, Great Britain and the Netherlands
• new NUTS2 structure in France, Lithuania and Ireland, and partially new structure in Hungary, Poland and Great Britain
• new NUTS1 structure in France and Poland

Availability
The approximately 1,000 maps for 42 European countries are available in all standard map formats, including *.shp (ESRI), *.tab (MapInfo), *.lay (RegioGraph) and Oracle Spatial. In addition to maps of postal and administrative levels, the country editions also include topographic details such as streets, bodies of water and city points categorized by number of inhabitants. All maps are vector-based and consequently offer infinite zoom and flexible viewing options.

Additional information
on GfK’s worldwide digital maps can be found here.

Print-quality illustrations
can be found here.

About GfK
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