Parks and Recreation is one of the City of Seattle’s largest departments. They manage over 450 parks and facilities and offer programming like sports, childcare, and fitness classes. Here’s how I led an information architecture redesign to make top tasks easier to complete on their website.
The problem
With about 700 pages, the Parks and Recreation website is difficult for residents to find what they need. One usability study participant reported:
“I’m a working mom, I’m only looking at your site after my kids go to bed. I can’t call customer service for help at 9pm.”
Plus, the navigation and home page design elements hadn’t been updated in 6+ years.
My role
To make content easier to find online, I led an information architecture and home page redesign. This included conducting user research, designing a site map and prototype, conducting usability testing, writing documentation, and presenting findings and work to stakeholders.
I made top tasks easier to complete
In a usability study, I asked participants to complete several “top tasks” on either the current website or a redesigned prototype. I found that the average success rates of 10 out of 17 tasks were higher on the newly designed prototype.
How I came up with top tasks
I identified popular tasks that users may come to the website for by reviewing web analytics, complaint call logs, annual reports, and interviewing subject matter experts. I held a workshop with our stakeholder to organize this research into customer profiles.
How I improved my design
Since four top tasks were less successful in usability testing, I analyzed user behavior and feedback to improve the new design.
For example, users were looking for discounts on programming, which they could find by clicking on “Apply for scholarships.” A couple users thought scholarships were for college. So I changed the link text to “Apply for financial aid.”
How I recruited usability study participants
I wanted these website changes to prioritize the needs of residents affected by racial and social inequities, so that’s who I tested with.
I asked community centers in neighborhoods that are highlighted on the City’s Racial and Social Equity Index map to share a screener survey on their Facebook pages.
I chose ten participants who fit our customer profiles and identified as either BIPOC, immigrant/refugee, and/or someone who has applied for government assistance.
I worked with the department to provide each participant with $100 of aquarium and zoo tickets.
See my usability study guide.
Final design
Some changes to the website included:
Adding 50 links to the navigation
Creating 15 new category pages for better organization
Removing 40 unnecessary pages
Improving the names of 30 pages
Redesigning the home page
How I improved the navigation
The old navigation (left) hid most of the content under only 4 main links, which users describes as “vague.” The new navigation (right) has 7 main links, 2 utility links, and many secondary links.
How I improved the home page
Users described the old homepage as “busy” and often didn’t notice the top links. Here’s the old homepage:
Here’s the new home page:
The new desktop navigation has dropdowns with secondary links and descriptions. The home page includes links to translated information that was previously hidden in PDFs. If you scroll down the new home page you’ll see it’s more robust—with links to top parks, news updates, and current projects.
The results
I created detailed documentation in a spreadsheet for the team to implement these improvements in phases after I left my job at the City of Seattle.
I packaged my research findings and design into this final presentation (PDF) for the Parks and Recreation department.
View the new Parks and Recreation website to see the improved navigation and home page (note: some changes may have been made since this project in 2022).