Metadata
Settlement Boundary Rules
When digitising the following choices were made:
- ROADS
- On the edge of the man-made (main) bit of the road, ignoring the grass verge.
When the road is on the edge of the town, it will take the outer edge.*
- RAILWAYS
- Most Railway Lines have an embankment (slope) down to the tracks. This means that on MasterMap it looks very
complicated - the whole area is clssified as 'Decriptive Group:Rail', but has an polygon of
'Decriptive Group:Landform', over the top of it.
Since slopes should only be used occasionaly as boundaries (due to the unclear nature of their edges)
the top of the 'Rail' embankment should be used as the settlement boundary.
- GARDENS
- Both the front and rear gardens of buildings should be included. Where MasterMap defines a boundary fence, the outer edge of the
structure should be used.*
- FARMS
- Should the entrance to the farm complex be directly linked to a settlement then this farm would be included
in the settlement.
In most cases the a distinction can be drawn between the domestic buildings around the main farm house and
the outer barns.*
- ALLOTMENTS
- These shoud be included in the settlement, although it is recognised that the areas can be difficult to identify
in some places (mastermap and aeral photography inconsitancies for example).
- SCHOOL PLAYING FIELDS AND PUBLIC RECREATION GROUND
- These should be included in the settlement, except in places where they would distort the size of the settlement as a whole
(e.g. Old Hall Green). In these cases, the same process as for large estates should be used and a closer boundary drawn.
- LARGE ESTATES/STATELY HOMES
- Stately homes and large estates sufficiently attatched to a settlement may be included,
but an arbitary line may be drawn to exclude parts of an estate that are considered to be outside of a settlement,
and would therefore created a disproportionate view.*
- WARD BOUNDARIES
- These will only come into decisions when there are two settlements next to each other
- COUNTY BOUNDARY
- While it is true that in certain places the county is a natural bounday, while the original digitising process was undertaken,
the settlement edge would follow normal rules. For example, it would go to the outside of the road and may cross over slightly.
EXPLANATION FOR RULES: *The same as Urban Areas 1991 Guidelines
Detailed Lineage
The initial Urban Areas were an extraction from a county wide Green Belt coverage based on the ten District Plans and
digitised from 1:10,000 scanned maps. This coverage was one of a series of 'Planning Restraint' coverages developed to support
a range of projects including Local Government Review and the Mineral Waste Local Plan.
After a number of discussions with involved parties it was decided that the District Plans (in their various stages of development)
were the most appropriate source of information for the production of these coverages and with particular reference to the
Green Belt Coverage, the boundaries drawn around settlements would constitute the extent of that urban area.
After producing the Green Belt coverage, the second stage was to reverse out the 'holes' in the Green Belt to give the first
urban areas. This was to be the base for the Urban Area coverage that was to include all settlements identified in the
Environment Planis Document entitled "Hertfordshire Settlements - Key Statistics".
This coverage of settlements 'within' the Green Belt was then expanded to include other urban areas outside the Green Belt
and the parameters for these areas were defined using a set of guidelines based on how the district plans had been constructed.
As a general 'rule of thumb' the following guidelines would be pursued:
- When ever possible the digitising would follow defined boundaries.
- Each area would include any main roads directly attached to the outer boundary.
- School Playing fields, graveyards and recreation areas on the edge of an urban area would not be included
unless sufficiently enclosed by other development (allotments would normally be excluded).
- Residential development would normally include the front and rear gardens.
- Should the entrance to the farm complex be directly linked to a settlement then this farm would be included
in the urban area.
- Stately homes and large estates sufficiently attached to a settlement may be included,
but an arbitrary line may be drawn to exclude parts of an estate that are considered to be outside a settlement boundary
and as such disproportionate to that urban area.
- With particular reference to the Borough of Broxbourne the divisions between Hoddesdon, Broxbourne, Cheshunt
and Waltham Cross were defined using current Enumeration Districts (with some small modifications) taken from the
Broxbourne Proposals for the Environment Department 'Planis' document entitled
"Census Geography for Hertfordshire", which defines urban areas by 1991 Wards, Parishes and Enumeration Districts,
in conjunction with the 1:10,000 Enumeration District Maps.
Full Settlements Metadata