Remember our pilot site? We have an update

One of our new topics is about planning a move to or from Boston.

Yea, so… we know it’s been a couple of months since we had an update to pilot.boston.gov. We’ve been busy user testing and building the site, and now we have new stuff to show you.

We just launched two new topic pages that we’re excited to show you: Getting around Boston and Moving.  Remember topic pages? They’re a new way of organizing content that reaches across City Hall’s departments to help quickly  get stuff done and learn more about our City.  

Whether you want to take the MBTA, or figure out how to maneuver around the City on a bike, Getting around Boston has options for you. Planning a move is never fun for anyone, but our new Moving topic page gives you some tips and resources to turn to when you need help.

We know that these topic pages aren’t finished products. We might need to add more information, but that’s OK. Please, let us know how we can get better. We want your feedback.

With this latest update, we’re also giving you a preview of how department pages will work on the new site. Right now you can see departments as contacts on our new and old topic pages, but they will also be a part of our navigation in the future. The key word with the department pages is “preview” — these are not finished products.

Departments will feature much more content, including news and announcements, blog posts, events, and content directly related to each department. Until then, we wanted to give you a taste of what the core of these pages is starting to look like, with contact information up front and out in the open.

Oh, and one more thing, you see that magnifying glass at the top right of the screen? You can search now! Granted, there’s not much on the pilot site to search, but we heard so many requests for it, so we wanted to make sure you know it’s available and will become more robust.

We’re still busy rewriting and rethinking the content from our old site, and how best to move it over into our new design, but we plan to give you updates and a glimpse at new features much sooner in the future. We want you to see what we’re working on, but more importantly, we want you to give us feedback. Your input helps drive our decisions, and will continue to as we roll out our new site.