Hannah "Rivka" Barrett
UX Researcher
Information Architecture | City of Cambridge
Overview
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Purpose:
For young professionals moving to the city for work, there’s a great deal to do while getting settled into a new place, such as applying for a resident parking permit or looking up trash/recycling times.
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Client:
I completed this project for Gregg Almquist's Information Architecture course at Bentley University, and chose to focus my independent project on the City of Cambridge website. The City of Cambridge is part of the Boston metropolitan area, and its website is designed to help residents and visitors find the information and resources they need to live and work in the city.
Important information can be difficult to find on the City of Cambridge website, leading to increased calls to City Hall, late payments and fees, and other negative impacts. I wanted to make information on the website easier for new and current residents to find.
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Objectives:
I examined the structure and content of the City of Cambridge website for information architecture issues. Based on my findings, I created a redesigned site map and wireframes of the re-organized website.
Process:
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Chose a website to be the focus of my project -- in this case, the City of Cambridge website
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Created a sitemap based on the current structure and content, and highlighted issues with the information architecture
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Based on my evaluation of the current website, I defined a) my business goals, b) user groups, c) user tasks, d) user scenarios and e) user task flows to focus on in my website redesign.
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Created a revised sitemap
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Created mobile wireframes to visualize my recommended redesigns
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Described my process in a final PowerPoint report
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Tools:
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Microsoft Excel and PowerPoint
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Sketch
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Project Duration:
6 weeks (September 9-October 20)
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Group members: Individual Project
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Summary of Findings: The City of Cambridge website offers a great deal of information and resources for Cambridge residents and visitors. However, issues include an overwhelming number of navigation categories (causing cognitive overload for users), confusing or inconsistent category names, and non-mobile-friendly features, among others.
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Keywords: Information architecture, sitemaps, wireframes, interaction design
Creating Sitemap of Current Website
Procedure
To create the sitemap of the current City of Cambridge website, I examined the website navigation, content and structure. Using a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet, I documented the following:
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Primary, secondary, tertiary and quarternary navigation and structure
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Structure of global utility menu
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Structure of global footer
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I noted the following issues in the website navigation, content and structure:
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Too many navigation categories to choose from, leading to cognitive overload
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Inappropriate or confusing category names
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Inconsistencies between category names and the pages they link to
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Links that took me to different websites, forcing me to move off the City of Cambridge website
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​Other usability issues included:
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Non-mobile-friendly website pages
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Lack of accessibility features
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Defining business goals, user groups, tasks and scenarios
Determining Redesign Goals
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Based on my examination of the current website, I defined my goals for the redesigned website structure:
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Make the primary navigation more action-based and intuitive
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Improve findability of information
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Group related items to better fit users’ mental models
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Use category names that better signal to users which items they can find under those categories
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Include more relevant subcategories previously not included in primary navigation on current website
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Allow users to find the information they need without having to leave the City of Cambridge website
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Improve the accessibility of the website for people with disabilities
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Selecting User Flows for Redesign
For my redesign, I focused on two user flows that I felt highlighted many issues I found with the website navigation and structure. These user flows are related to the user scenario, in which a young professional has just moved to Cambridge and needs to apply for a Resident Parking Permit.
City of Cambridge Sitemap Redesign
Utility Menu
I wanted the Utility Navigation Menu to be a place where users could go to address their most immediate concerns: finding jobs, paying bills online, signing up for important alerts, contacting officials or reporting an issue.
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All primary navigation items are listed in order of priority - physical safety comes before financial security, for example, so I've listed Alerts & Updates first.
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Secondary and tertiary categories are listed according to alphabetical order. In addition, I'm including toggles for text size and contrast to accommodate users with disabilities, which I did not see on the current website.
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Primary Navigation Menu
I included a Home icon so users would have an easy way to return to the homepage from other parts of the website. In addition, after reviewing competitor sites, I decided I wanted related categories to be grouped together, rather than simply listed in alphabetical order.
I also felt that task-based primary categories would make more compelling calls-to-action than listing Services or Departments. Therefore, I decided to use more task-based categories such as "Live or Visit" (which focuses on concerns or tasks that may be important to residents or visitors), "Work" (for those who want to find employment or start a business in Cambridge), and "I Want To" (for people who want to complete other tasks on the website).
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I grouped all information related to city offices, legislation and legal documents, licenses and permits, and records under Civic Services. I listed this information according to priority. I listed City Government first since this information should be the most accessible for users.
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Global Footer
I consider the global footer to be a place for valuable but not necessarily popular information on the website, and I wanted to keep it as simple as possible by only using primary and secondary levels.
I kept the information included for the footer on the current website, but added the following primary navigation categories: City Offices, Report an Issue, and Public Notices & Bylaws. I also added a link to the sitemap at the bottom of the footer.
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City of Cambridge Mobile Website Redesign
Homepage: Content and Navigation Redesign
Redesigned User Flow: Applying for a Resident Parking Permit
Homepage --> Traffic & Parking Landing Page
Traffic & Parking Landing Page --> Parking Permits Landing Page
Parking Permits Landing Page --> First Time Permit Applications --> Apply for Resident Parking Permits
Apply for Resident Parking Permits --> Online application form
What I Learned
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Consider the website's main users and their mental models when deciding on category names and which website pages fall under each category. A card sort may be helpful for determining how to structure your website in a way that is intuitive for your users.
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Creating a sitemap of the current website navigation and structure is especially helpful for pinpointing issues and consistencies, and helps you focus subsequent redesigns.
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Be sure to review the content of website pages for information that may be more appropriate for a different page or under a different navigation category.