European postcode map

August 10, 2010 4:51 AM

Where can I source a high-res map of Europe with postcode areas marked?

I need to find a high-res map of Europe which shows postcodes and their boundaries.
It's for a publication and I'm willing to pay, but can't find any good sources.
I'd want to download the map in pdf, psd or jpg format.
Thanks for your help.

posted by Blackwatch to Travel & Transportation (7 answers total)

I don't even know if such a map exists (or it it's realistically possible, for that matter): every country has its own set of postcodes, and they vary with state, region, city and, in larger cities, districts and even single neighborhoods.
posted by _dario at 5:06 AM on August 10, 2010

Sort of like this?
posted by public at 5:13 AM on August 10, 2010 [1 favorite]

Good lord, it would be enormous.

In the UK, for example, a typical postcode is town (e.g. BA = Bath), area (1 or two digit number), sub area (1 digit number), street/organisation (two letters), i.e. Bath Spa is BA1 1SJ.

You could take it up to an area like BA1, or BA1 1, but even for the UK alone you're talking about a pretty big map.

There is a free map here.
posted by MuffinMan at 5:15 AM on August 10, 2010

A dutch website sells maps with the first two characters of the postcode. For high resolution and more positions, you're probably looking at GIS data, for instance the 6PP dataset for the Netherlands. Very expensive, it's around €80.000 for the Netherlands alone!
posted by Psychnic at 6:04 AM on August 10, 2010

public's link does sell the UK postcode map in PDF or GIF format, so you should probably inquire if they do the same for the Europe one that they sell printed.
posted by smackfu at 6:20 AM on August 10, 2010

I know some countries' post codes are unique for an area as small as a few buildings on a street. Therefore a map showing this level of detail would be huge in print (like Steve Wright's "Scale: 1 mile = 1 mile." map of America).
An electronic version of this map would be similar to licensing each country's GPS map, which I reckon would be very expensive for non-personal (publication) use.
posted by rothar at 8:14 AM on August 10, 2010

Response by poster: Hi - Thanks so much for the suggestions.

Just to be clear - I need a map with two-character codes and their boundaries.

For example, in the UK, it would show the KY, CA, NE areas, etc, while in France it would show 22, 35, 72, that kind of thing.

Thanks once again.
posted by Blackwatch at 4:19 AM on August 11, 2010