Geospatial Standards
Minnesota Geospatial Standards, Domains and Lookup Tables
Minnesota's geospatial standards are established by the Minnesota Geospatial Advisory Council (GAC) to improve data sharing by reducing incompatibility
during data acquisition, processing, and dissemination. These standards are not intended to define internal data capture or storage specifications for data
producers, and their use is not mandated by the State of Minnesota. However, organizations within Minnesota are encouraged to adopt these standards to facilitate
data exchange and aggregation.
PUBLIC REVIEW NOTICE
An attribute is being proposed for addition to the Address Point and Road Centerline Data Standards. See the request for comment announcement for details about this proposal and provide feedback by September 23, 2026.
Standards Approved by the Minnesota Geospatial Advisory Council (GAC)
The GAC is in the process of reviewing and approving standards earlier approved by the former GCGI.
As each of the earlier standards is approved by the GAC, it will be moved to the GAC table below and removed from the GCGI table.
| Name of Standard | Additional Resources |
| Address Point Data | Domains and lookup tables (see section below) |
| Bikeways Data | Domains and lookup tables (see section below) |
| CTU ID (City, Township, Unorganized Territory) | Domains and lookup tables (see section below) |
| County ID | Domains and lookup tables (see section below) |
| Damage Assessment Data | |
| Emergency Service Zone Data | Domains (see section below) |
| Parcel Data | Domains and lookup tables (see section below) |
| PLSS Point Data Standard | Domains and lookup tables (see section below) |
| Positional Accuracy Measuring and Reporting | Positional Accuracy Handbook: Using the national standard for spatial data accuracy to measure and report geographic data quality |
| Road Centerline Data | Domains and lookup tables (see section below) |
| State ID | |
| Stream ID (Codes Identifying Reaches and Watercourses) | |
| U.S. National Grid |
USNG
pages: Federal Geographic Data Committee
USNG pages: Emergency Preparedness Committee |
Standards Approved by the Minnesota Governor's Council on Geographic Information (GCGI)
| Name of Standard | Additional Resources |
| Minnesota Geographic Metadata Guidelines | Metadata help |
| Codes Identifying Watersheds | |
| Codes Identifying Lakes and Wetland Basins |
Standards Under Development by the Minnesota Geospatial Advisory Council (GAC)
| Name of Standard | Status |
| Digital Stormwater System Data Exchange | Draft standard developed by the Metro Stormwater Geodata Project, building on earlier work by the GAC Standards Committee, was open for public review through September 3, 2021. |
Domains, Lookup Tables and Schema Templates for GAC Standards
| Resource | Description |
|
Domains (xlsx), updated 7/24/2026
- used especially in address point, parcel, and road centerline standards |
An Excel file with a separate tab for each of the more than 80 domain tables used in all of the GAC approved standards. Also included is an index tab showing which standard(s) each domain is used in and a changes tab showing the last time each domain was modified. |
| Lookup Tables (xlsx), updated 8/12/2025 | County; State; U.S. Postal Service Default City (5 worksheet tabs) |
| GAC Standards Schema Templates (fgdb and xml formats), updated 5/26/2026 | Includes the domains and lookup tables |
Return to the GAC Standards Committee homepage