Activities of the Cadastre in the
Netherlands I
Towards a multi-purpose Cadastre*)
by ir. J. Polman, head of the department of automation of the Cadastral Service in the
Netherlands.
The actual activities of the Cadastre in the Netherlands
are based on a long tradition. The Dutch Cadastre as an
institute has been in existance for 150 years, and it is
thus one of the oldest cadastral services in the world.
The Cadastre may be old but it is not old-fashioned. On
the contrary, in this period of 150 years its tasks and
activities have exhibited a steady evolution. It is my
privilege to tell you something about this.
The original purpose of the Cadastre was the admini
stration of landed property for a fair levy of land taxes.
This tax was based on the area of the parcels of land and
the profit made on it.
From the very start the cadastral map has been used as a
means to identify parcels involved in the transfer of real
rights on real estate. Soon after the introduction of the
cadastre the designation of parcels became obligatory
in official deeds. For this reason the Cadastral Service
turned moreand more to the task of affording protection
to real estate. Part of this task was the surveying of
boundaries in order to reconstruct such boundaries in
case of discord.
In this way the function of the Cadastre became mainly
the supply of information on real rights on real estate
and on the actual state of landed property. It is laid down
in several laws that specific land data shall be recorded
in the cadastral registers. It is also provided in various
regulations that use has to be made of data from the
cadastral registers and maps. In this way the original
cadastral administration has developed into an impor
tant source of information for both the government and
private persons.
In contrast with many other countries all basic tasks in
property administration are fulfilled by a single institu
tion: the Cadastral Service in the Netherlands.
These tasks are:
- keeping the Public Registers, containing all the deeds
concerning the transfer of property and the establish
ment of mortgages;
- keeping the cadastral records of real rights on real
estate;
- surveying the boundaries of cadastral parcels;
- making cadastral maps, representing the cadastral
parcels.
Inleiding gehouden op 23 juni 1982 tijdens de door de NVG
georganiseerde studiedag in het kader van de bijeenkomst
van het Comité Permanent van de FIG te 's-Gravenhage.
210
cadastral
registers
(rights)
public
registers
(deeds)
cadastral
maps
(parcels)
survey
documents
(boundaries)
The cadastral system is based on the following legal
principles:
- the principle of booking: no legal effect without
registration of deeds in the Public Registers;
- the principle of consent: the cadastral owner has to
consent to transfer of ownership;
- the principle of publicity: the Public Registers and the
cadastral administration are public;
- the principle of speciality: the cadastral parcel
number is unique and guarantees the identification of
real estate.
These four principles have resulted in the present
situation which in practice means that the Cadastre is a
very reliable source of information on the rights in
respect of real estate.
On the basis of the traditional task of the Cadastre - the
registration of property - a number of new activities has
been developed.
At the end of the nineteenth century the government
decided to establish a national co-ordinate system. To
this end a triangulation network has been realized at
three levels of densification. The measurement and
computation of this network was completed in 1930.
Since that year it has been the task of the Triangulation
Service of the Cadastre to keep the network up-to-date
and to supervise the quality of the network. The infor
mation on the triangulation points is available to all
NGT GEODESIA 82
