Interactive Parks Website for the Borough of Merton
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Project Number: BMV-CO34 Interactive Parks Website for the Borough of Merton An Interactive Qualifying Project Report submitted to the Faculty of the WORCESTER POLYTECHNIC INSTITUTE in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Bachelor of Science by ____________________________________ Qazi Saud Ahmad ____________________________________ Eun Kim ____________________________________ Daniel Paster ____________________________________ Darren Torpey Date: 28 February 2003 Approved: ________________________________ Professor Bogdan M. Vernescu, Advisor 1. Merton 2. Parks 3. Website ________________________________ Professor Jeanine D. Plummer, Advisor Executive Summary Our sponsor, Leisure Services of the London Borough of Merton, is a governmental organisation which provides services such as park maintenance, sports groups, and clubs to the public of Merton. Leisure Services already had a working web system which provided information services and was part of the Merton community website. However, they were not satisfied with the state of their previous website, and so they assigned us with the task of creating a template for a new website which would help them provide information services to the public in an effective manner. We researched background information on many elements of the London Borough of Merton, including factual information about Merton and its parks. Merton is one of the 32 boroughs that compose Greater London, England. It is an outer London borough and a suburb located south of London. Roughly 20 percent of Merton is occupied by 63 parks and open spaces. These parks include a variety of services, including sports facilities, water features, ornamental gardens, play areas, cafés, rest areas, one o‟clock clubs (daycare), pavilions, woodlands, and nature conservatories. We also researched background information on the website development process and important website design considerations. To design the template for the new website we followed the Unified Process. The Unified Process is an iterative and incremental development process based on a series of short, fixed-length small projects that continually enlarge and refine the whole system. The iterations in the Unified Process are organised into four major phases: inception, elaboration, construction, and transition. The website template went through several iterations ii where feedback was given to us from Leisure Services after the completion of each iteration. Our research shows that when designing a website there are four main considerations: usability, maintainability, governmental regulations and technical limitations. These four are fundamental criteria for good web design. Usability involves issues such as the client-site interface, data organisation, and navigability. Maintainability addresses the efficiency of training someone to update the website and one‟s ease of going through the updating process itself. Good websites also take into account governmental regulations regarding the issues of accessibility and content. Lastly, the final product is dependent on the capability of the hardware available to the website developer and other technical limitations. Our goal for this project was to create a template for a website that could help Leisure Services provide their services to the public. To achieve this goal, we first determined what information the public and Leisure Services wanted on the website. We gathered this data by conducting focus groups and interviews with the staff of Leisure Services and people interested in the parks. Focus groups are discussions between groups of people that are guided by a moderator about topics that interest the group and the researcher. We conducted a focus group with department mangers and our liaison to familiarise ourselves with the different departments within Leisure Services and get a better understanding of what type of information and services they wanted to see on the website. We asked questions ranging from the usefulness of different website features to frequently asked questions by the public. We also conducted three more focus groups with Friends of Merton, Lavender One O‟clock Club, and sports club members. Through these focus groups we were able to obtain the public‟s opinion on the type of information and iii services that they wanted available on the website. We asked questions about the type of information they would look for in a parks website, which parks they use and why, and what would make them use such a website. For those who were unable to attend the focus groups we e-mailed questionnaires and conducted phone interviews. Another method we used in the data gathering process was interviews. Through interviews with the managers of the separate departments within Leisure Services we obtained more information about the staff‟s problems with the current website and their expectations of a new website. We asked questions similar to those in the focus group with Leisure Services, but more specific to each department. For example, we asked what type of frequently asked questions each department received from the public through phone calls, and also what information and links each department would like to have in their section of the site. We categorised the data we gathered according to importance and ease of implementation in the website template. This created a priority ranking for each feature. To determine importance, lists of all the features were given to the department managers who then ranked them from most important to least important. Rank was also assessed by the number of times a feature was mentioned in the focus groups and interviews. We then compiled the results and applied our own ranking of ease of implementation to further rank the features. Then we used the rank of the features to determine which ones we should implement in the first template and which ones we could leave for implementation in later iterations. By following this approach we implemented the following features in the first iteration of our template: navigation, information about parks, contact information, announcements, calendar events, links and frequently asked questions. Most people wanted a website that was simple and had easy navigation. Keeping this idea in mind, iv we constructed the template of the website with unambiguous titles and links so that a user could easily navigate their way through the website to find the information. Content included on the website was information such as the facilities available at each park and contact information for specific departments. A search feature was implemented to enable a user to quickly locate the specific park or open space information they need by using certain criterion, such as location, name, or region. Also, to keep the community informed, we included an announcements page where any news about the parks or Leisure Services could be posted. Other features that were implemented in later iterations were a sitemap, contact information for Leisure Services and other organisations, and more options on searching and updating. The main goal for the template was to help Leisure Services provide information about parks and open spaces to the general public. From our data collection we concluded that Leisure Services needed a site that provides an easily accessible interface, helps facilitate networking between local communities, and provides services directly to the public. This template provided Leisure Services with a general design for their new website which will be implemented in the near future. The website will be a resource that connects Leisure Services with the community and connects the communities of Merton with each other. v Abstract Our project sponsor, London Borough of Merton Leisure Services, had a website that lacked adequate information about Merton parks. Our goal was to develop a template website that provides information about the parks. We conducted interviews and focus groups with Leisure Services‟ staff and the public to determine their needs for the website. From these results we produced a template website that satisfied Leisure Services and the public. We provided the community with information about parks through this template website, thus allowing better communication between the community and Leisure Services. vi Table of Contents Abstract ............................................................................................................................. vi Table of Contents ............................................................................................................ vii List of Tables ..................................................................................................................... x List of Figures ................................................................................................................... xi 1 Introduction ............................................................................................................... 1 2 Background ............................................................................................................... 4 2.1 Merton ..................................................................................................................... 4 2.1.1 History of Merton .............................................................................................4 2.1.2 Unitary Development Plan (UDP)...................................................................5 2.1.3 Leisure Services ...............................................................................................5