Roadway Asset Shapefiles
The Highway Information System (HIS) database contains highway information collected and maintained by the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet. No warranty, expressed or implied, is given to the accuracy, completeness, reliability, or suitability for any particular purpose of the information or data contained in HIS. If questions arise concerning the currency, meaning, or usage of the data, contact the Division of Planning at (502) 564-7183 or kytc.planningwebpage@ky.gov.

For Use With GIS
The six separate files in each .zip file together compose an ESRI™ SHAPEFILE and can be opened in a wide range of GIS programs. The shapefiles are in Kentucky State Plane Single Zone projection.

For Use In Spreadsheets
One of the six files is a .dbf file that can be opened in a spreadsheet program such as MS Excel.


- Descriptive metadata about extract contents:

State Primary Road System
  • State Primary Road System (SPRS) data
    - zip file containing: dbf, prj, sbx, shp and shx files
  • SPRS District Maps
  • SPRS maps by County (pdf)
  • SPRS Incorporated Area Map (pdf)
  • Statewide map (pdf) 
  • Urban Areas map (pdf) 
  • NHS Listing by Route Number (pdf) 
Terms and Descriptions:
Under KRS 177.020 the State Primary Road System classifies state-maintained roadways by the type of service and function they provide. 603 KAR 3:030 designates the following classes :

State Primary System: Interstates (symbolized by black lines on maps), parkways (brown lines) and other long distance, high volume intrastate routes (red lines) of statewide significance that generally link major urban areas within the state.

State Secondary System: Regionally significant routes (green lines) of shorter distance which provide mobility and access to land use activity, generally serving smaller cities and county seats within a region.

Rural Secondary System: Routes of sub-regional significance (yellow lines) which might include urban arterial streets and other collectors, often with access to land use activity such as farm-to-market routes as their main function.

Supplemental Roads: All other state-maintained routes (purple lines) such as frontage roads, cross roads and local access roads such as farm-to-market routes as their main function.
Geospatial Data
  • GPS Road Centerline Collection Standards  (pdf)
    Examples of driving and coding standards for GPS road centerline field data collection
  • GPS Road Centerline Maintenance Standards  (pdf)
    Roadway data collection standards for the GPS road centerline maintenance project
  • Kentucky Geography Network 
    Geospatial Data Clearinghouse for the Commonwealth of Kentucky
  • Non-Highway Modes zip file containing:
    dbf, prj, sbx, shp and shx files
  • Ferry Boats (FB)
  • Traffic Flow zip file containing: dbf, prj, sbx, shp and shx files
  • Traffic Flow (TF)
  • Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) zip file containing: dbf, prj, sbx, shp and shx files
  • MPO Area Functional Class Maps