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Not directly OSM-related but I thought there might be someone here
who knows...<br>
<br>
It seems that the formal boundary of Bristol City Council includes a
huge chunk of the Bristol Channel, from Avonmouth out to Steep Holm,
across to Flat Holm and back again. This was confirmed in 2007 by
the ceremony of "beating the bounds" (see [1]) in which the Mayor
reasserts his territory by following the complete boundary. He got
on a boat and went out to the islands. The islands themselves are
not included in his patch. Flat Holm is an exclave of Cardiff City
Council's area and Steep Holm belongs to North Somerset.<br>
<br>
However the boundary between England and Wales runs approximately
half-way between the two islands. I haven't found a definitive
statement of where the border lies, but every map I have found on
the internet shows it where it is in OSM. Therefore a triangular
area of water exists which is on the Welsh side of the border but
"owned" by an English authority. You can see this in [2].<br>
<br>
So Bristol is a cross-border authority, unless the national border
makes some kind of detour here.<br>
<br>
It's a purely academic discussion of course (who cares about a few
hectares of the Bristol Channel apart from the Mayor of Bristol),
but does anyone know any more? Are there any other examples of this
kind of border anomaly?<br>
<br>
Colin<br>
<br>
<a
href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/bristol/somerset/7019663.stm">[1]
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/bristol/somerset/7019663.stm</a><br>
[2] <a
href="http://openmapsurfer.uni-hd.de/?zoom=12&lat=51.37133&lon=-3.09757&layers=00000BFFF">http://openmapsurfer.uni-hd.de/?zoom=12&lat=51.37133&lon=-3.09757&layers=00000BFFF</a><br>
<br>
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