STAR*Map Frequently Asked Questions

The acronym STAR*Map is the trademarked name for the Southeast Texas Addressing and Referencing Map. Created and maintained by the Houston-Galveston Area Council, STAR*Map is a digital basemap and database that covers a multi-county region, including all of Austin, Brazoria, Chambers, Colorado, Fort Bend, Galveston, Harris, Liberty, Matagorda, Montgomery, Walker, Waller, and Wharton Counties. STAR*Map includes more than 2 million parcel address points and 13 counties street centerlines.

STAR*Map includes three data layers in ESRI shapefile and file geodatabase formats for 13-county H-GAC region.
1. Address points.
2. Roads (street centerlines).
3. Zipcodes.

Most orders are processed within 1 to 2 business weeks. Credit card purchases are delivered upon completion of the order, while checks must be received and cleared before completing the order. You can pay with a check or credit card (Visa or Mastercard). Please make the check payable to: Houston-Galveston Area Council, purpose: STAR*Map and send it to:
Houston-Galveston Area Council
Data Services Department
3555 Timmons Lane, Suite 120
Houston, TX 77027

There are no other additional charges. We will handle the shipping.

The advantage with the subscription is to receive the updates by shapefile/geodatabase and STAR*Map map services on a monthly basis.

Projection/Coordinate System = State Plane (Texas South Central Zone)
Units = Feet (US Survey Foot)
Datum = NAD83
Spheroid = GRS1980

H-GAC will provide a one-time copy of STAR*Map to the school's library or GIS lab for academic usage free of charge. Further updates would require the educational organization to purchase STAR*Map either via a one-time purchase or the annual subscription option. Any educational organization who receives a copy of the STAR*Map (paid or otherwise) does not have the right to share the STAR*Map database with any third party or other educational organization, and should restrict users from downloading the database. Students should contact their library or GIS lab to gain access to the STAR*Map database. Education organizations are required to abide by all STAR*Map licensing restrictions.

Yes, STAR*Map includes all the drivable roads in both the unincorporated and the incorporated areas. It does not include the latest corporate boundaries.

No, We don't provide layer by layer. We only distribute the packaged product.

Updates to STAR*Map are released monthly. There are 12 updates per year.

The dataset includes address points but not actual parcel polygons.

Yes, it can be distributed through our FTP download site in file geodatabse and shapefile format. Payment is required in advance.

The STAR*Map is very current (within 3 months) of all platted development. You will find the STAR*Map to be the most up-to-date street centerline basemap for this area.

No agreement is required. You can allow contractors to use the STAR*Map for projects they are completing for your organization, but are required to remove all instance of STAR*Map following the completion of the project. If this contractor works for a different organization on a similar project then they should purchase a copy of STAR*Map for that organization. Star*Map may not be shared or resold outside your organization.

There is a field in the roads layer called "Road_Class" that you can use to symbolize the roads on the map. It is the field that we use to differentiate the different types of roads on a map. It is a very useful tool to display roads on your maps.

STAR*Map is exactly what you need to geocode your address list.

A readme file comes with each STAR*Map release. It includes some metadata.

STAR*Map includes all of Austin, Chambers, Brazoria, Fort Bend, Galveston, Harris, Liberty, Montgomery, Waller, and Wharton, Colorado, Matagorda and Walker Counties.

We don't distribute in AutoCAD format. We distribute in an ESRI shapefile and goedatbase. You would have to convert it from a shapefile to AutoCAD format.