gisco_get_lau: Local Administrative Units (LAU) dataset

In giscoR: Download Map Data from GISCO API - Eurostat

Local Administrative Units (LAU) dataset

Description

This dataset shows pan European administrative boundaries down to commune level. Local Administrative units are equivalent to Communes, see gisco_get_communes().

Usage

gisco_get_lau(
  year = 2024,
  epsg = 4326,
  cache = deprecated(),
  update_cache = FALSE,
  cache_dir = NULL,
  verbose = FALSE,
  country = NULL,
  gisco_id = NULL,
  ext = "gpkg"
)

Arguments

year	character string or number. Release year of the file. One of \Sexpr[stage=render,results=rd]{giscoR:::db_values("lau", "year",TRUE)}.
epsg	character string or number. Projection of the map: 4-digit EPSG code. One of: "4326": WGS84. "3035": ETRS89 / ETRS-LAEA. "3857": Pseudo-Mercator.
cache	. These functions always caches the result due to the size. See See Caching strategies section in gisco_set_cache_dir().
update_cache	logical. Should the cached file be refreshed?. Default is FALSE. When set to TRUE it would force a new download.
cache_dir	character string. A path to a cache directory. See Caching strategies section in gisco_set_cache_dir().
verbose	logical. If TRUE displays informational messages.
country	character vector of country codes. It could be either a vector of country names, a vector of ISO3 country codes or a vector of Eurostat country codes. See also countrycode::countrycode().
gisco_id	Optional. A character vector of GISCO_ID LAU values.
ext	character. Extension of the file (default "gpkg"). One of \Sexpr[stage=render,results=rd]{giscoR:::db_values("lau", "ext",TRUE)}.

Details

The Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics (NUTS) and the LAU nomenclature are hierarchical classifications of statistical regions that together subdivide the EU economic territory into regions of five different levels (NUTS 1, 2 and 3 and LAU , respectively, moving from larger to smaller territorial units).

The LAU classification is not covered by any legislative act. Geographical extent covers the European Union, EFTA countries, and candidate countries. The scale of the dataset is 1:100 000.

The data contains the National Statistical agency LAU code which can be joined to LAU lists as well as a field GISCO_ID which is a unique identifier consisting of the Country code and LAU code.

Total resident population figures (31 December) have also been added ins some versions based on the associated LAU lists

Value

A sf object.

Note

Please check the download and usage provisions on gisco_attributions().

Source

https://gisco-services.ec.europa.eu/distribution/v2/.

Copyright: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/gisco/geodata/statistical-units.

See Also

gisco_get_communes().

See gisco_bulk_download() to perform a bulk download of datasets.

See gisco_id_api_lau() to download via GISCO ID service API.

Other statistical units datasets: gisco_get_census(), gisco_get_coastal_lines(), gisco_get_nuts(), gisco_get_urban_audit()

Examples

## Not run: 

lu_lau <- gisco_get_lau(year = 2024, country = "Luxembourg")

if (!is.null(lu_lau)) {
  library(ggplot2)

  ggplot(lu_lau) +
    geom_sf(aes(fill = POP_DENS_2024)) +
    labs(
      title = "Population Density in Luxembourg",
      subtitle = "Year 2024",
      caption = gisco_attributions()
    ) +
    scale_fill_viridis_b(
      option = "cividis",
      label = \(x) prettyNum(x, big.mark = ",")
    ) +
    theme_void() +
    labs(fill = "pop/km2")
}

## End(Not run)

giscoR documentation built on Dec. 10, 2025, 9:08 a.m.