4-page Case Study - Posted 5/14/2008

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eCityGov Alliance

Regional Government Alliance Builds Connections with Integrated Mapping

The eCityGov Alliance is a regional inter-local agency located in the Puget Sound region of Washington State that provides Internet-based services and information to business and local residents. eCityGov develops cross-boundary, multi-functional Web sites where users can find online access to a suite of services including permitting, commercial property information, recreation resources, shared vendor rosters, and more. To make its recreation and parks Web site especially user-friendly, the Alliance wanted to add an interactive mapping and search feature. eCityGov used Microsoft® Virtual Earth™ to build an application where users can search, locate, and visualize regional parks and recreational resources. With Virtual Earth, eCityGov delivered a rich user experience, reduced the time and cost of implementation, and freed limited technology resources to focus on higher-value tasks.

Situation

A regional inter-local agency located in the Puget Sound region of Washington State, the eCityGov Alliance works to strengthen the communities it serves by providing seamless, convenient Internet-based services and information to visitors, business, and local residents. The Puget Sound region is the economic and cultural hub of Washington and the Alliance’s member cities and agencies are its heart. 

Citizens and businesses in the region have to cross geographic and political boundaries every day. Local businesses are likely to have operations that span several jurisdictions. A resident living in the City of Bothell might work in the City of Bellevue, own real estate in the City of Issaquah, and hike public trails in the City of Snoqualmie on the week-ends. People who live, work, and do business in the region need services provided by more than one city, sometimes more than once a day.  

To deliver seamless service to regional citizens, the Alliance developed cross-boundary, multi-functional Web sites to provide users with convenient online access to many services offered by member cities,  including permitting services at MyBuildingPermit.com, available commercial property information at NWProperty.net, general property information at NWMaps.net, shared Procurement at WaGovBiz.net, and regional recreation resources at MyParksAndRecreation.com (MPR.com). The MPR.com Web site provides a single portal to activity registration and related park and recreation services in the region. 

When the Alliance launched the MPR.com site in 2005, it included a recreation activity search and registration application. When the project team decided to add a park, trail, and recreation facilities search function for the site, it wanted to incorporate an interactive mapping application. The Alliance was using Geographic Information System (GIS) data from member cities but it knew that the city by city GIS approach would not be an appropriate solution for the regional MPR.com site. The project team knew that the GIS data would be in different formats, which would complicate and slow development of the application. The project team would have to organize and standardize the GIS data, straining the Alliance’s budget and requiring significant time commitments from its limited GIS development resources.

The eCityGov Alliance sought to develop a ubiquitous mapping layer for the park search application that it could implement quickly and then manage and maintain easily. The team wanted an application that it could expand and integrate with other applications, so it could ensure application stability and performance as new member cities were added and more information was uploaded to MPR.com. And, of course, the Alliance wanted to create a mapping application that would deliver a rich customer experience to people searching for regional parks, trails, and recreation facilities, and that would be accurate, fast, and simple to use.

Solution

The eCityGov Alliance understood that it didn’t make sense to use local GIS data to add an interactive mapping layer to the park-search functionality on MPR.com. At the same time, the Alliance wanted to replace a GIS mapping function used by the NWProperty Web site with a ubiquitous, higher performance mapping service. With this in mind, the Alliance evaluated several solutions. Ultimately, eCityGov chose Microsoft® Virtual Earth™ mapping software to develop the mapping platforms for both Web sites.

The ability to add new members and features quickly is a huge benefit to us. With Virtual Earth, we can provide services and information in ways that have never been possible before. John Backman Executive Director, eCityGov Alliance

The Alliance had also evaluated a Google mapping solution. But in tests, the project team found that some of the data available from Google was out of date or lacking coverage. “Looking at new developments, I could find parks in the Virtual Earth data that didn’t exist in Google,” says Kimberly Kallinger, Project Manager at eCityGov Alliance. “The quality of data and the frequency of its updates strongly influenced our choice of Virtual Earth.”

Using Virtual Earth, the Alliance built a search application in MPR.com that allows users to search, locate, and see visual representations of parks, trails, and recreational facilities across all Alliance member cities. By building a Microsoft SQL Server® database in a Web interface, and then integrating the data over the native Virtual Earth mapping layers, the MPR.com project team developed a park search function that provides a rich user experience for regional residents looking for local parks, trails, and recreation facilities.

Users begin a search by opening a map of the region. By clicking on a highlighted Alliance city, they open a detailed map of the city that displays the locations of all city parks.  The user can discover a selected park’s location relative to his or her current location and relative to other parks in the city. By moving the pointer over a park button, users open a window with links to a detail page that offers photos, descriptions of park features, and driving directions. They can zoom into specific parks to get a more detailed location view, and also can choose among a road map view, an aerial photo view, or a hybrid view.

Users can refine a regional search by specific park names, by location, or by park amenities such as swimming pools, covered picnic structures, or tennis courts.  For example, by entering “pools” in the search box, a user can display the locations of all the parks with swimming pools, either in selected cities or in all MPR.com member cities. “Virtual Earth demonstrates the power of bringing tabular data and mapping tools together to create easy-to-use navigation and search functions,” says John Backman, Executive Director at eCityGov Alliance. “Our experience indicates that many park users’ highest priority is convenient access to parks, whether that is close to home, school, or work.  With Virtual Earth, handicapped residents can see how far the parking lot is from a specific picnic table, or parents of tots who love Thomas the Tank Engine can find park playgrounds with trains.”

The eCityGov Alliance launched the park search capability on MPR.com in January 2007. In early 2008, the project team began adding new features to the application for both end users and member cities. The team is adding public trails and recreation facilities to both the map and search databases. On the back end of the application, it created a content editor that member cities can use to easily add, remove, and modify information. Each member city has staff with log-on permission that have access to the content editor, where they can edit or create new pages, or even manually draw hiking trails onto a map for MPR.com.

“Now cities can provide park users with consistent, detailed information in the park pages,” says Kallinger. “For instance, cities can take pages for parks and add interior pages with details about available children’s facilities or pet play areas. It’s going to be an awesome resource for our park-goers.”

Benefits

By offering seamless, cross-boundary, online services to customers who live, work, and play in the region, the eCityGov Alliance is helping its member cities develop a new model for how government can deliver services to the public. Using Virtual Earth to develop the search function on MPR.com, the Alliance delivered a rich user experience on the Web site that helps regional residents get the most from local recreation resources. By significantly reducing the amount of time it took to implement the interactive mapping application, the Alliance reduced costs and freed limited technology resources to focus on higher-value tasks.

Richer Customer Experience

With Virtual Earth, the Alliance has enhanced the services its member cities offer and helped regional residents get the most from their regional parks. By providing residents the ability to view park resources, services, and amenities, the Alliance created a rich, rewarding experience for MPR.com users.

Virtual Earth demonstrates the power of bringing tabular data and mapping tools together to create easy to use navigation and search functions. John Backman, Executive Director, eCityGov Alliance

Quick Deployment, Lower Cost

By using Virtual Earth, the eCityGov Alliance significantly reduced the amount of time it took to implement the park search application, saving taxpayers at least 25 percent. It launched the service in less than half the time it might have taken using traditional GIS methods. “With GIS, it would have taken at least twice as long,” says Kallinger. “And it would have been more expensive because project team members wouldn’t have been able to load the data themselves. It would have taken a GIS Web developer.”

Better Resource Allocation

By not relying on its limited GIS resources, eCityGov freed its GIS developers to work on higher-value projects, such as developing a traffic map that displays current traffic conditions in real time, or road closures caused by snow or other weather conditions. “With Virtual Earth, a knowledgeable Web developer can develop mapping applications so that we don’t need the expertise of a GIS Web developer,” says Backman. “That takes the pressure off higher-order GIS staff, so those skills and scarce talents can be used for more specialized GIS projects.” 

Easy Extensibility

Because Virtual Earth is extensible and can be easily integrated with other applications, eCityGov project teams can incrementally and continually improve applications over time, for instance adding new content to the park search on MPR.com. The Alliance can add new member cities to sites easily because it doesn’t have to gather GIS data for each new member. On the NWProperty Web site, the Alliance plans to integrate permitting data from MyBuildingPermit.com to show the status of permits for commercial property listings.

“The ability to add new members and features quickly is a huge benefit to us,” says Backman. “With Virtual Earth, we can provide services and information in ways that have never been possible before.”

Microsoft Virtual Earth
The Microsoft Virtual Earth platform is an integrated set of services providing quality geospatial data, rich imagery, cutting edge technology, and dependable performance that helps organizations visualize data and provide immersive end-user experiences. With ongoing investments in innovation driven by customer feedback, the Virtual Earth platform continues to offer new map detail and imagery, feature enhancements, and robust platform capabilities. 

For more information, visit
www.microsoft.com/virtualearth

For More Information

For more information about Microsoft products and services, call the Microsoft Sales Information Center at (800) 426-9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft Canada Information Centre at (877) 568-2495. Customers who are deaf or hard-of-hearing can reach Microsoft text telephone (TTY/TDD) services at (800) 892-5234 in the United States or (905) 568-9641 in Canada. Outside the 50 United States and Canada, please contact your local Microsoft subsidiary. To access information using the World Wide Web, go to:
www.microsoft.com

For more information about eCityGov Alliance products and services, visit the Web site at:
www.myparksandrecreation.com
and www.ecitygov.net