Role: Project Manager, Researcher, UX Designer
Research Methods: Market Analysis, Survey, Survey Safari, Diary Card, Observation
Analysis Methods: Affinity Diagram
Concept Generation Tools: Superheroes from 75 Tools for Creative Thinking,
Design Tools: Adobe XD, InDesign
Time Frame: 12 weeks
The Challenge
The brief set by CATAPULT Transport Systems focused on resolving current transportation issues in the UK, such as overcrowded roads and an anti-carpooling mentality.
The Solution
PEDL is a vehicle-sharing platform mainly intended for rural areas of the UK, where users can rent bikes, cars and scooters while also lending their own vehicles to other users to rent.
Project Brief
Create or alter an existing mobility service to alleviate current transportation issues. Our main focus is to enable customers to have a unified system that allows them to travel short and long distances.
The primary goal of the research phase is to understand the needs unique to travel in small cities and in the countryside. Our insights will be used to find ways to reduce the number of vehicles on the road. Our solution for this can range from enabling mobility sharing services for the countryside, easing handoffs between existing transportation services or fighting the common assumption in the UK that cars give people increased freedom of mobility.
Focusing the Brief
Since the brief given to us was very broad, we set out to narrow it down by holding an ideation session where any idea on what to focus on could go on the wall. We then clustered them into categories, voted and narrowed it down to 5 topics.
After consulting with the client, we started off by running a survey in UK universities with a centralised campus in a rural area, similar to Loughborough University, in order to pinpoint the main pain points of students and faculty.
Market Analysis
While we were waiting for the results of the survey to come in, we also wanted to have a better understanding of the market, competition and solutions that already existed. For this, the whole team sat together to find & analyse competitors.
Additional Research
After the analysis of the survey, we managed to eliminate some topics and ended up with 3 main topics for the brief:
• Public Transport
• Biking Experience
• Traffic Conditions on Campus
We decided to further investigate these topics using the following research methods:
• Survey Safari - experiencing & observing the local public transportation for ourselves
• Diary Card - focusing on students who commute by bike, we had 6 participants for a duration of a 3 day study
• Observation - observing two barrier entrances during morning rush hour for a duration of 2 days
Four W's
To focus our research and design solution, we used the Four W's framework:
• Who – undergraduate & postgraduate students aged 18-26
• What – effectiveness of campus transportation & general commute and vehicle sharing habits
• When – during short distance commute to their studies or long distance commutes to their families
• Where – on & off campus
Chosen University Focus
We chose our primary research focus to be Loughborough University. We gave strict definitions to the aspects that contribute to the transportation problem at Loughborough, in order to extrapolate the data to similar universities.
Loughborough University campus is centralised, rather than dispersed through a city like some universities in dense urban centres like London. Loughborough also has gated security entrances to limit vehicles entering campus. Loughborough University is located in the English midlands and has a student population of about 17,000.
Concept Generation
Based on the research findings we started generating concepts in two waves. We first had a generic brainstorming session, after which we decided to use the "Superheroes" card from the "75 Tools for Creative Thinking" deck. This method helped us get away from the normal and obvious ideas by making new associations and finding solutions from a different perspective.
After coming up with a number of ideas, we did a selection process where we checked what pain points each solution would solve from our research. If the solution wouldn't solve all pain points, we would remove the idea.
The final selection of ideas was then presented to CATAPULT.
Solution Generation
Once we had talked to CATAPULT and had a clear selection for a concept, it was time for us to flesh it out and create a well thought-out service.
We began the process by agreeing on the concept, some basic technical details both for users and vehicle owners and the UX guidelines, to help us stay on track.
App Concept Description
PEDL is a mobility sharing platform that allows customers to rent and lease vehicles to others, including cars, scooters and bikes. Our research suggests that many people who own cars feel it is necessary to have one for the sake of mobility and commuting. However, many people drive their cars less than three days a week. Our service enables them to loan their car to make a profit. By enabling people to rent cars from one another we can reduce the traffic, congestionand the pollution that results from this.
There are currently many issues with traveling both in cities and the countryside. However, companies that try to solve this problem act in isolation, causing complex journeys, inefficient routes and costly fares. PEDL streamlines these lanes of travel together, allowing users to seamlessly use bikes, scooters and cars to get to their destination. As a mobility sharing service, it is perfect for special occasions, shopping trips or other instances that are ideal for cars. By letting people share vehicles, we can reduce the amount of cars on the road and the environmental impact they have.
PEDL offers discounts for various forms of ride-sharing. Rentals are cheaper for larger groups, and drivers are alerted if other users are asking for a ride along their journey. By agreeing to chauffeur others on a trip, drivers are rewarded an even cheaper fare! PEDL allows people access to cars when they need it, without worrying about maintenance, enabling them to spend money and time on what is important to them or make money on days their cars are unused.
Feature List
To make sure we had a good idea of what we want to present to CATAPULT, we decided to create a roadmap for how the features would be introduced and when.
This also gave a good idea of the growth and direction the service could be taken in, but also allowed for a logical and natural growth of the service and product.
Personas & Storyboard
The team created three personas and storyboards to cover all the spectrums we decided to focus on; short journeys, long journeys and vehicle owners.
The Challenge
As the complexity of the service started to unfold with the personas, storyboards, task flows and sitemaps, the team faced the biggest challenge throughout the project: how do we best present the solution while keeping it simple, easy to understand, and use for users?
We decided to take some inspiration from Uber, who solved this solution by creating two apps. One for drivers and one for riders. So we decided to split the service into two apps as well; one for vehicle owners (LEND) and one for riders (PEDL).
Task Flows & Sitemaps
Once we had the personas and storyboards, I created task flows to have a better understanding of the flow users will have to take once we got to prototyping. Along with my efforts to create task flows for each scenario, the team created sitemaps based on them.
We chose to have separate apps since the task goals for those lending and borrowing vehicles are different. By separating the apps, we can create better experiences for our users by designing an app specifically for their needs,highlighting the UX Guidelines we set for our service.
If these were combined into a single app, this would create a more bloated experience, that would inherently be more complicated to navigate.
One drawback we acknowledge in this set up is that it isolates both types of users from one another. Since those lending their vehicle have a separate app, it hinders them from renting a vehicle from another user.
Design Process
The process consisted of three stages.
1. Initially sketching consisted of ideas for ways to provide quick glanceable information to vehicle owners, about the booking schedule of their vehicles. In addition, sketching out the screens required, based on the task flows for both apps.
2. Then once all screens required for the pre-determined task flows were created, a low-fidelity prototype was created using Marvel App. I then tested this with users, to determine any flow, interaction and design changes that were needed to be made in the high-fidelity prototypes.
3. Lastly, I created the high fidelity prototypes in Adobe XD.
UI flow of PEDL app for users who wish to use vehicles provided by our service - Click on image/here to try the prototype
UI flow of LEND app for users who lend their vehicles using our service - Click on image/here to try the prototype
Branding
As part of the design process, one person in our team was tasked with branding for the app (colour schemes & app icons) as well as vehicle branding.
Finishing Touches
To flesh out the idea and present the final service properly to the client, we decided to also look at multiple questions and problems regarding how the service would work both towards travellers and lenders.
Following that, we created a short and long-term plan and came up with three different business models for the client to chose from.
Deliverables & Client Presentation
To wrap the project up, we created a booklet and a presentation which I presented to the client together with one other team member. These deliverables can be found below.