Municipal annexation is the legal process by which a city or other municipality acquires land as its jurisdictional territory (as opposed to simply owning the land the way individuals do).
The rules that govern municipal annexations in absorption of neighbouring territory vary by country.
[3] For example, in the United States, incorporated cities and towns often expand their boundaries by annexing unincorporated land adjacent to them.
Laws governing the ability and the extent municipalities can expand in this fashion are defined by the individual states' constitutions.
The City of Calgary, for example, has in the past annexed the communities of Bridgeland, Riverside, Sunnyside, Hillhurst, Hunter, Hubalta, Ogden, Forest Lawn, Midnapore, Shepard, Montgomery, and Bowness.