Municipalities
As with many other states in the New England region, Rhode Island is divided into 39 municipalities that handle all local governance. These municipalities have clearly defined borders, and should be considered the default city for any roads within those borders.
- Barrington (GIS)
- Bristol (GIS)
- Burrillville (GIS)
- Central Falls (PLAT)
- Charlestown (GIS)
- Coventry (GIS)
- Cranston (GIS)
- Cumberland (GIS)
- East Greenwich
- East Providence (PLAT)
- Exeter (GIS)
- Foster
- Glocester (PLAT)
- Hopkinton (PLAT)
- Jamestown (GIS)
- Johnston (GIS)
- Lincoln (GIS)
- Little Compton (PLAT)
- Middletown (GIS)
- Narragansett (PLAT)
- New Shoreham (PLAT)
- Newport (GIS)
- North Kingstown (GIS)
- North Providence (PLAT)
- North Smithfield (GIS)
- Pawtucket (PLAT)
- Portsmouth (PLAT)
- Providence (GIS)
- Richmond (GIS)
- Scituate (GIS)
- Smithfield (GIS)
- South Kingstown (GIS)
- Tiverton (GIS)
- Warren (GIS)
- Warwick (PLAT)
- West Greenwich (PLAT (bottom of page))
- West Warwick (GIS)
- Westerly (GIS)
- Woonsocket (GIS)
Villages
Municipalities can be further subdivided into named villages; though often times, the boundaries of these villages are not as clearly defined. In most cases, we can refer to zip code boundaries to determine village locations; however some zip codes are for P.O. Boxes only. Thus, only villages that are tied to a standard (non-P.O. Box) zip code should be mapped. Those villages are:
- Ashaway (02804)
- Bradford (02808)
- Carolina (02812)
- Chepachet (02814)
- Clayville (02815)
- Greene (02827)
- Greenville (02828)
- Harrisville (02830)
- Hope (02831)
- Hope Valley (02832)
- Kenyon (02836)
- Kingston (02881)
- Manville (02838)
- Mapleville (02839)
- North Scituate (02857)
- Oakland (02858)
- Pascoag (02859)
- Riverside (02915)
- Rumford (02916)
- Saunderstown (02874)
- Shannock (02875)
- Slatersville (02876)
- Slocum (02877)
- Wakefield (02879)
- West Kingston (02892)
- Wood River Junction (02894)
- Wyoming (02898)
For roads in these areas, the village should be the primary City name, with the municipality the village is contained in listed as an alternate City name.
Census Designated Places
When the original Waze basemap was first introduced, it utilized Census Designated Places (CDPs) to determine the boundaries for cities on the Waze map. These CDPs are arbitrary areas defined by the U.S. Census Bureau for the purposes of statistical analysis, and are redefined with each new census every 10 years. As a result, these named areas are not suitable for defining city boundaries in Rhode Island. If a road has a city name that is not in the above lists, then it's probably a CDP name and should be changed.
Official Rhode Island policy is that Census Designated Places should not be mapped