National River Flow Archive
Integrated Hydrological Units of the United Kingdom: Hydrometric Areas with Coastline
(IHU Areas with Coastline)
(Hydrometric areas for Great Britain and Northern Ireland)
Cite this dataset as:
National River Flow Archive (2014). Integrated Hydrological Units of the United Kingdom: Hydrometric Areas with Coastline. NERC Environmental Information Data Centre. https://doi.org/10.5285/1957166d-7523-44f4-b279-aa5314163237
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https://catalogue.ceh.ac.uk/maps/cca47088-8cdd-4d7a-86b4-90f0a1766364?request=getCapabilities&service=WMS
https://doi.org/10.5285/1957166d-7523-44f4-b279-aa5314163237
This dataset is part of Integrated Hydrometric Units (IHU) of the UK. Hydrometric Areas are used to organise river flow measurement and hydrometric data collection in the UK. Hydrometric Areas are either integral river catchments having one or more outlets to the sea or tidal estuary, or they may include several contiguous river catchments having topographical similarity but separate tidal outlets. In mainland Britain they are numbered from 1 to 97 in clockwise order around the coast commencing in north east Scotland. The larger islands and groups of islands are numbered from 100-108. Ireland has a unified numbering system from 1 to 40 commencing with the River Foyle catchment and circulating clockwise; not all Irish Hydrometric Areas, however, have an outlet to the coast. Only those Hydrometric Areas covering Great Britain and Northern Ireland are included in this dataset. The boundaries between hydrometric areas correspond to catchment boundaries as digitally-derived from CEH Integrated Hydrological Digital Terrain Model (IHDTM) using a catchment definition program. It should be noticed that the Northern Ireland data are clipped to its political boundary so not every Hydrometric Area in this region is completely represented.
The naming and numbering convention for the hydrometric areas in Great Britain was originally defined by the Inland Water Survey Committee (and first published in the Surface Water Year-Book of Great Britain 1936-37). For Northern Ireland the system was developed by a multi-agency working group in the 1970s (and first published in Surface Water: United Kingdom 1971-73. Note that full citations of those two publications are provided as additional information source.
This dataset represent the same entities as the IHU Hydrometric Areas of the UK without Coastline, however, the outer boundaries of the units follow coastline published by the Ordnance Survey (Meridian 2), rather than the boundaries of the CEH Integrated Hydrological Digital Terrain Model.
The naming and numbering convention for the hydrometric areas in Great Britain was originally defined by the Inland Water Survey Committee (and first published in the Surface Water Year-Book of Great Britain 1936-37). For Northern Ireland the system was developed by a multi-agency working group in the 1970s (and first published in Surface Water: United Kingdom 1971-73. Note that full citations of those two publications are provided as additional information source.
This dataset represent the same entities as the IHU Hydrometric Areas of the UK without Coastline, however, the outer boundaries of the units follow coastline published by the Ordnance Survey (Meridian 2), rather than the boundaries of the CEH Integrated Hydrological Digital Terrain Model.
Publication date: 2014-06-23
View numbers valid from 01 June 2023 Download numbers valid from 20 June 2024 (information prior to this was not collected)
Format
Shapefile
Spatial information
Study area
Spatial representation type
Vector
Spatial reference system
OSGB 1936 / British National Grid
Temporal information
Temporal extent
2014-06-23 to …
Provenance & quality
The hydrometric areas are based on watershed derived from the Integrated Hydrological Digital Terrain Model (IHDTM) elevation grid using an in-house catchment definition program. In Great Britain the coastline corresponds to the OS Meridian2 coastline. In Northern Ireland the boundary and coastline was derived from OS Panorama data in times when Ordnance Survey covered Northern Ireland. All boundaries have been processed to ensure they are topologically correct; there are no gaps or overlaps so every point in the country is allocated to one and only one Hydrometric Area
Licensing and constraints
Licence, copyright and IPR apply
Cite this dataset as:
National River Flow Archive (2014). Integrated Hydrological Units of the United Kingdom: Hydrometric Areas with Coastline. NERC Environmental Information Data Centre. https://doi.org/10.5285/1957166d-7523-44f4-b279-aa5314163237
Related
Services associated with this dataset
Integrated Hydrological Units of the United Kingdom View Service
This dataset is included in the following collections
Citations
Harrigan, S., Prudhomme, C., Parry, S., Smith, K., & Tanguy, M. (2018). Benchmarking ensemble streamflow prediction skill in the UK. Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 22(3), 2023–2039. https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-22-2023-2018
Prosdocimi, I., Dupont, E., Augustin, N.H., Kjeldsen, T.R., Simpson, D.P., & Smith, T.R. (2019). Areal Models for Spatially Coherent Trend Detection: The Case of British Peak River Flows. Geophysical Research Letters, 46(22), 13054-13061. Portico. https://doi.org/10.1029/2019gl085142
Seibert, J., Vis, M.J.P., Lewis, E., & van Meerveld, H.J. (2018). Upper and lower benchmarks in hydrological modelling. Hydrological Processes, 32(8), 1120-1125. Portico. https://doi.org/10.1002/hyp.11476
Supplemental information
Ministry of Health and Scottish Office (1939) The Surface Water Year-Book of Great Britain 1936-37. His Majesty Stationary Office. London.
Water Data Unit (1978) Surface Water: United Kingdom 1971-1973. Department of the Environment / Scottish Development Department / Department of the Environment for Northern Ireland. Her Majesty's Stationery Office. London. 193pp.
Correspondence/contact details
National River Flow Archive
UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology
Maclean Building, Benson Lane, Crowmarsh Gifford
Wallingford
Oxfordshire
OX10 8BB
UNITED KINGDOM
nrfa@ceh.ac.uk
Wallingford
Oxfordshire
OX10 8BB
UNITED KINGDOM
Author
National River Flow Archive
Centre for Ecology & Hydrology
Other contacts
Custodian
NERC EDS Environmental Information Data Centre
info@eidc.ac.uk
Publisher
NERC Environmental Information Data Centre
info@eidc.ac.uk
Owner
Centre for Ecology & Hydrology
nrfa@ceh.ac.uk