Pennsylvania DMV Sitemap and Wireframes
Information Architecture Class Project
Information Architecture Class Project
For my Information Architecture class at Bentley, we were asked to identify a poorly structured and designed site as a case study for us to redesign. As a former Pennsylvania resident, I remembered how challenging I had found the Department of Motor Vehicle's website when I tried to renew my driver's license, so I chose that site.
The site has a huge amount of information that the DMV needs to publish, but very little thought had been put into organizing it in a consumer-friendly manner.
For this project, I focused on improving the sitemap structure, enhancing the navigation, and clearly identifying the most frequent actions on each page to streamline the most important actions.
Due to the limited timeline of a class project, I did not conduct any user research, card sorting or usability testing. These activities would no doubt greatly improve these concepts.
The site has a huge amount of information that the DMV needs to publish, but very little thought had been put into organizing it in a consumer-friendly manner.
For this project, I focused on improving the sitemap structure, enhancing the navigation, and clearly identifying the most frequent actions on each page to streamline the most important actions.
Due to the limited timeline of a class project, I did not conduct any user research, card sorting or usability testing. These activities would no doubt greatly improve these concepts.
Current Pennsylvania Department of Motor Vehicles website.
Critique of major issues with the home page.
The current site organization has an interesting split of "Online Services" and "Information Centers".
To actually renew your driver's license, the path is:
Home > Online Driver and Vehicle Services > Renew Your Driver's License.
To find information about how to renew your driver's license, the path is:
Home > Information Centers > Driver's License / Photo ID Information Center > Renewing Your Driver's License
This artificial split of information and services may make sense internally to the DMV, but it doesn't make sense to the consumer. The consumer should not need to make the root decision - do I want information? or do I want to use an online service?
To actually renew your driver's license, the path is:
Home > Online Driver and Vehicle Services > Renew Your Driver's License.
To find information about how to renew your driver's license, the path is:
Home > Information Centers > Driver's License / Photo ID Information Center > Renewing Your Driver's License
This artificial split of information and services may make sense internally to the DMV, but it doesn't make sense to the consumer. The consumer should not need to make the root decision - do I want information? or do I want to use an online service?
Redesigned sitemap.
In my redesign, I removed that distinction between Information and Services and integrated them. I also moved the "useful" labels such as "Driver's License", "License Plates" from the second level up to the top level in the hierarchy.
In my redesign, I removed that distinction between Information and Services and integrated them. I also moved the "useful" labels such as "Driver's License", "License Plates" from the second level up to the top level in the hierarchy.
Redesigned Homepage.
My redesigned homepage achieves the following:
My redesigned homepage achieves the following:
