First step in City Website overhaul includes user-friendly Traffic and Parking Website; New City Website to debut later this year

The City’s Traffic and Parking Department (T&P) introduced a new website, according to Acting Director, Matthew Dias.  The new website boasts improved, user-friendly features, including online payment and streamlined permitting options, direct links to traffic-related information and policies, and updated parking information.  Since joining T&P in September 2010, Dias has implemented several changes, which, in addition to the new website, will include experimenting with new wireless meters that accept credit cards, capital improvements to the building’s lobby, and streamlining the appeals process.  The new T&P website can be viewed at http://www.parksomerville.com/.  The City plans to roll out its full, updated website later this year.

“The Mayor’s primary goal is excellent customer service, so our job as a department is to ensure that interactions with and for residents and community members are accurate, courteous, transparent, and convenient,” Dias said.  “This website will, I hope, be a valuable tool for our constituents when conducting business with this Department, as well as help to alleviate any confusion regarding our policies and regulations.  Further, we want residents to know that we are soliciting feedback about the website, with the goal of providing additional improvements, such as online permitting, over the course of the next year,”

“In the short amount of time that Matt has been at the helm of T&P, he and his staff have worked tirelessly to ensure that customers receive the best possible service, and the new website is just one example of their hard work and the new and exciting things we expect from them in the year ahead” said Mayor Curtatone.  “I know that Somerville constituents will find this site very useful, and helpful, and it is another step in the right direction as we continue to build and improve upon our existing technologies.”

The new and improved T&P website also includes useful links to MBTA advisories and bus schedules, direct links to the City’s snow emergency and street sweeping regulations, information about bike lanes and pedestrian improvements, and new online permitting and hearing request systems.  In the next month, additional customer service innovations will also be implemented, including a wireless parking meter pilot program, which will give constituents the option to pay for parking meters via credit card for the first time.  That pilot is scheduled to begin in March.

To provide feedback on the T&P site, please e-mail traffic@somervillema.gov, or for general information on Traffic and Parking regulations and procedures, please call 311.

(from the city of Somerville)