Best Regional Website

The National Park Service hired Alexander & Tom, Inc. (A+T) to build an interactive web site using web 2.0 technologies for the Star Spangled Banner National Historic Trail, a 560-mile land and water route that tells the story of the War of 1812 in the Chesapeake Bay region. The trail connects historic sites in Maryland, Virginia, and the District of Columbia, and commemorates the events leading up to the Battle for Baltimore, which inspired Francis Scott Key to write our National Anthem. The Star Spangled Banner trail traces American and British troop movements, introduces visitors to communities affected by the war, and highlights the Chesapeake region’s distinctive landscapes and waterways. The completed website, available at www.starspangledtrail.net, has provided users in the Chesapeake Bay region to find parks by activity or location, get directions to those parks using Google APIs and allows them to interact with the National Park Service by rating parks, sharing them on social media, and creating a list of visited sites. The Star Spangled Banner National Historic Trail website was built using the Expression Engine content management system, which enables NPS staff to update the site without having to write code. Additionally, the content of the site is driven by a central database so that locations can be shared with other websites and applications.

Contributors:

President:	Billy Twigg
Creative Director:	Micah Piccirilli
Multimedia Designer:	Dirk Torrijos
Developer:	Josh Magness
Project Manager:	John Goodwyn
Web Administrator:	Michael Land

ALEX + TOM

Location: United States

About the Agency:

Digital expertise and world-class design. Alex + Tom has been an award-winning interactive marketing team for over 15 years.