Rutland Regional Planning Commission
About
The Rutland Regional Planning Commission (RRPC) serves as a vital resource for community planning in Vermont, dedicated to preserving the state’s way of life on a human scale. Through collaborative efforts with towns, developers, and local partners, RRPC promotes best practices in land use, balancing local desires with informed educational outreach to uphold community values and goals.
The Challenge
The RRPC’s website did not effectively represent its role as a central planner for all 27 towns in Rutland County, Vermont. It lacked a visual identity that aligned with its mission, and its architecture was insufficient for key functionalities such as posting monthly meeting minutes and agendas for its eleven boards and committees. The site was difficult to navigate, making it hard for users to find essential information about community initiatives and goals. Additionally, the dependency on the original website developers for updates led to excessive maintenance costs.
Goals
The primary goals for the Rutland Regional Planning Commission (RRPC) website redesign were to enhance the site’s functionality and user experience. Key objectives included:
- Content Reorganization: Streamline the main navigation and content organization to allow users to access important information quickly and efficiently, reducing the number of clicks required to find specific content.
- Visual Alignment: Introduce custom illustrations that reflect the mission and goals of RRPC, ensuring that the visual elements resonate with site visitors and enhance the overall aesthetic.
- Document Management: Improve the functionality for posting and managing board and committee meeting minutes, agendas, and other critical documents such as budgets and community bulletins, making it easier for RRPC staff to update and maintain these resources independently.
Innovative Features
Reorganized Main Navigation
The main navigation was completely overhauled to improve accessibility. We designed intuitive menus that allow users to quickly access information with a single click, significantly enhancing the user experience and ease of navigation across the website.
Meeting Minutes & Agendas
We developed a user-friendly interface that enables users to efficiently filter and download meeting minutes and agenda documents. This system is organized by specific boards or committees, document type, date, year, and status, streamlining the process of finding and accessing important governance documents.
Custom Illustrations
A bespoke footer illustration featuring iconic and historical landmarks of Rutland County, such as towns, lakes, ski mountains, waterfalls, and farms, was created to add a local touch and visual appeal to the site. Additionally, custom icons were designed for each program the RPC provides, further enhancing the visual identity and making the services more identifiable to site visitors.
Results and Impact
Website Design & Development: The comprehensive redesign and development of the RRPC website have successfully transformed its online presence. The introduction of bespoke graphical elements has visually aligned the website with the RPC’s mission, enhancing the site’s aesthetic and relevance to Rutland County. We significantly improved the site’s usability, enabling users to find important information and resources efficiently. From an administrative perspective, we developed a custom backend interface that allows RRPC staff to independently manage content—such as agendas, meeting minutes, staff updates, bulletin board posts, and announcements. This capability has drastically reduced their reliance on external support for routine updates, thereby cutting yearly maintenance costs. Moreover, it has greatly accelerated their ability to keep the website current, ensuring that it serves as a dynamic, up-to-date resource for the community.
We recently worked with Group6 to create a new website for the Rutland Regional Planning Commission, and the experience was nothing short of fantastic. From the outset, the team at Group6 was incredibly responsive and always available to answer questions and provide updates. Their creativity shone through in the design, which perfectly captures the essence of our organization while being user-friendly and visually appealing.
What truly sets Group6 apart is how easy they are to work with. They listened carefully to our needs and ideas, offering thoughtful suggestions that elevated the final product. The process was smooth and efficient, with the team demonstrating a high level of professionalism throughout.
We’re thrilled with the new website, and it’s already making a significant impact on how we engage with our community. If you’re looking for a web design team that’s creative, responsive, and a pleasure to work with, we highly recommend Group6!
Karen Hill
Office Manager
