Cartographying the real metropolis: A proposal for a data-based planning beyond the administrative boundaries. Juan R. Selva-Royo¹, Nuño Mardones¹, Alberto Cendoya² ¹University of Navarra, School of Architecture, Department of Theory and Design, University of Navarra Campus, 31080 Pamplona, Spain; ²University of Navarra, ICS, Navarra Center for International Development, University of Navarra Campus, 31080, Pamplona, Spain E-mail: jrselva@unav.es, nmardones@unav.es, cendoya.alberto@gmail.com Keywords (3-5): Data planning, metropolitan areas, big data, urban extent, good governance Conference topics and scale: Cartography and big data   Nowadays, there is a great gap between the functional reality of urban agglomerations and their planning, largely because of the traditional linkage of urban management to the administrative limits inherited from the past. It is also true that the regulation of urban activities, including census and statistical information, requires a closer view of its citizens that can only be addressed from the municipal level. In any case, it is clear that the metropolitan delimitation has met useful but often ethereal or exclusionary criteria (economic or labor patterns, functional areas...), which become disfigured by an administrative reality that does not always correspond to the real metropolis. This paper, aware of the new cartographic possibilities linked to the big data - CORINE Land Cover, SIOSE, multi-sector digital atlases (in many cases referred to the urban extent, etc.) and other open system platforms - explores the evidence that might base a new objective methodology for the delimitation and planning of large urban areas. Indeed, what if basic data for cities would arise not from administrative entities but from independent outside approaches such as satellite imagery? What if every single sensing unit (every citizen, company, building or vehicle) directly issued relevant and dynamic information without going through the municipal collection? Finally, the research analyzes the eventual implications of this data-based planning with administrative structures and urban planning competencies in force through some current case studies, with the purpose of achieving a more efficient and clear metropolitan governance for our planet.  References (100 words) Aguado, M. (coord.) (2012) Áreas Urbanas +50. Información estadística de las Grandes Áreas Urbanas españolas 2012 (Centro de Publicaciones Secretaría General Técnica Ministerio de Fomento, Madrid). Angel, S. (dir.) (2016) Atlas of Urban Expansion (http://www.atlasofurbanexpansion.org) accessed 29 January 2017. Brenner, N. and Katsikis, N. (2017) Is the World Urban? Towards a Critique of Geospatial Ideology (Actar Publishers, New York). Florczyk, A. J., Ferri, S., Syrris, V., Kemper, T., Halkia, M., Soille, P., and Pesaresi, M. (2016). ‘A New European Settlement Map from Optical Remotely Sensed Data’, IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing 9, 1978-1992.