A bright future for Stevenage Borough Council's presence on the
web
Client profile
Stevenage was Britain's first New Town. It was designed
in 1946, with its first residents moving in in 1952. Stevenage
Borough Council currently covers a total of 34,000 households, and
its website is a key resource for providing important information
to residents and visitors alike.
Business need
The existing web site was begining to show its age, and with
plans for the eventual expansion of their web presence
(possibly to include more sites and an Intranet), Stevenage needed
a better solution. They chose Alterian's ACM-p content management
system to give them greater flexibility with better editorial
control. They were also keen to improve their presence on the
social web by making better use of Twitter, Facebook, Flickr and
YouTube, as well as introducing a blog.
What Auros did
Auros were contracted to design and implement a site that would
build a stronger brand for the Council, and make it easier for
users to find information and interact with them.
Minimal existing branding, and an open-minded approach
from the client, meant that Auros were free
to create a strong new look for the site, without any need to
include the common print-design cliches that are so often
found on local council web sites. A commercially-free web font was
chosen as the foundation for the new branding, along with
complementary colours to support the Council's own dark green.
Inspiration was taken from the modernist style in which much of
1950's Stevenage was built, in particular the clock tower in the
town centre. A drawing of this now occupies the footer of every
page on the site.
A bold design that gives equal prominence to text and
photography is backed up by slick interaction behaviour that allows
the Council to deliver a large amount of content via the homepage
without it ever looking crowded or confusing. ACM-p content-types
have been used to provide reusable blocks of content which can be
spread throughout the website but controlled centrally, making
maintenance easier. A simple and fast site search, as well as an
unusually bold and clear A to Z helps to make it easy for users to
find what they are looking for.
The continuing availability of ongoing technical support from
Auros completes the package, providing great peace-of-mind to go
with a great website.
And now for the science bit...
The new website was implemented against ACM-p version 5.9.5
across a complete Microsoft infrastructure. Windows Server 2008,
IIS 7.5 and SQL Server 2005 form for the application layers used to
host and support the website.
The Smart Client and Web client are used by content editors to
manage content. Active Directory Integration has been utilized to
allow content editors to re-use their domain login credentials for
accessing the system.
The nature of the Master / Slave infrastructure which has been
configured allows Stevenage to easily upscale and provide
resilience in case of failure.
The website itself makes use of some of the latest technologies,
libraries and practices in web development today
- jQuery (of course) is used to implement
the JavaScript functionality.
- A CSS grid system has been adopted to provide a controlled and
fixed layout through a uniform and repeating grid.
-
Universal IE6 CSS is used to apply a functional
style across the site to accommodate these users.
- Open Search provides browser
integrated search, enabling users to search the Stevenage website
directly from their browser.
- Disqus provides the commenting system used
for feedback on the blogs.