Look at Utah’s New Web Initiative to Boost Tourism
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Having already seen increased attendance at national parks in the Beehive State, boosting the visibility of state parks is the next step.
While this week is National Park Week, state parks need love, too. And that’s one of the reasons the Utah State Parks system has launched a streamlined and more intuitive website.
The site’s emphasis is on providing timely information that draws tourists to the state and gets visitors outdoors quickly.
Large landscape images of Utah’s public lands feature prominently on the site, while the most sought-after information is easily accessible on the homepage and landing pages.
“Utah’s state parks offer a wide variety of experiences and accommodations for our visitors,” Utah State Parks Director Fred Hayes said in a statement. “We want our new website to highlight what we have and to motivate people to plan vacations. The new website will be the one stop needed to plan and book any trip to a state park.”
Online services like annual park pass sales, off-highway vehicle and personal watercraft classes, reservations, and event signups can all be found through the site.
That’s along with directions, park and off-highway maps, current weather conditions for each park and more basic information like park offerings, fees, hours, and contact information.
Social media is also integrated into the site.
In February, in a similar move, CaliParks released a web-based app relying heavily on data-visualization in an effort aimed to attract the next generation of park visitors.
Slightly more sophisticated than Utah State Park’s endeavor, CaliParks’ app aggregates Instagram and Flickr photos to provide a realtime feel for each park and allows users to filter searches for parks by proximity and activity.
Utah already ran a statewide campaign advertising its “Mighty 5” national parks and attracting record-breaking numbers of visitors in the process, The Spectrum newspaper in St. George reported.
Add to that the “Find Your Park” push Utah’s five national parks are a part of, and visitation is already up in 2015. Zion National Park has seen a 28 percent increase in visitors between January and March—481,150 people, KSTU reported.
The increased visitation has led to greater wear and tear on parks roads and trails and strained park resources. In 2014, the National Park Service reported $11.49 billion in postponed maintenance projects, The Salt Lake Tribune reported, $278 million of which came from the Mighty 5.
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