October 29, 2002
CINCINNATI, OH – The Cincinnati Park Board on Tuesday unveiled a significant new area of its website, developed by Summersault, LLC. The “Park Finder” allows residents of Greater Cincinnati to search for and view information about natural resources in ways that are centered around their needs.
“The tool completely changes the way a user interacts with the website,” said Chris Hardie, Principal Developer at Summersault and project lead. “Previously, they could just look at a long list of parks and click on one without really knowing if they wanted to visit that park. Now, they can search for parks near them, or parks that have particular trails, or parks that have programs for kids. The possibilities are endless.”
By
leveraging the power of databases and of web-based management tools, Summersault
was able to create a system where all the information about the Parks
can be searched and displayed in ways that are meaningful to individual
users, instead of a “one size fits all” approach.
As a part of the new feature launch, the site also includes a new dynamic events calendar, and a new system for displaying Parks-related news. However, the bulk of the improvements, says Hardie, were behind the scenes. “We created a significant amount of online administrative resources for the Park Board staff. Now they can manage and grow their website on their own, instead of depending on Summersault or other third parties,” he said.
Larry Annett, Cincinnati Park's WEB site coordinator, notes that visitors to the WEB site can use Park Finder to develop and execute a unique/personalized search of the City's 5,000 acre park system's assets-features, nature education programs and, special events. Mr. Annett further notes that the internet based content management tools developed by Summersault have enabled/empowered non-technical oriented Park staff to update portions of the WEB site quickly and efficiently. He is confident that the content management tools will help Cincinnati Parks achieve its objective to reduce on-going site maintenance costs.
The Cincinnati Park Board maintains and operates the City of Cincinnati’s system of parklands. The mission of the Park Board is: “To conserve, manage, sustain, and enhance parks’ natural and cultural resources and public green space—for the enjoyment, enlightenment and enrichment of the Cincinnati community.”
Summersault, LLC, founded in 1997, is a leader in database driven web solutions. The Richmond, Indiana based firm offers a single point of contact for highly customized web design and application development solutions, as well as professional consulting services and support.
