Illustrator Artboard Size Restrictions

I have a project where I need to need a huge artboard bigger than the default size illustrator gives you.
We are designing huge custom maps for a client and also use some illustrator map plugins which we use to do some extra stuff, but we can only work within the artboard.
Is there any way round this, to increase the artboard size?  This is going to cause us a huge problem if we cant.
It is not a typical project where I can export into everything into photoshop and scale or print to scale as its a map and we need to do all the work within illustrator to size,
Please advise
Thanks in advance

I really need to have an unlimited artboard.  I have made it the maximum size, but really need to have it about 6 times the size.
I cant understand why illustrator would restrict you too 227 inches.  Its a massive issue for us on this big project we are working on.
Is there any plans to increase the artboard past this or ways round this?  I have seen lots of others request this feature and other vector sofware I have seen have unlimited artboard sizes

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