Reimagining University Ridesharing
With the increase in gas prices and rates of pollution, carpooling through rideshare platforms is becoming a popular way to save money as well as leave a positive impact on the environment.
The UC Davis Rideshare Group on Facebook is thriving with 31.9k members and is flooded with posts from college students searching for rides to neighboring cities.
The Challenge
With so many users, students struggle with navigating through disorganized feeds and finding the right rides.
Overview
The project was prompted by Design Interactive, an on-campus UX organization that hosts a 6-week cohort sprint every Fall and Spring.
My team was tasked with designing an app that aids all of the pain points university students have when using the "UC Davis Rideshare" Facebook group. We followed a human-centered design process, working through iteration after iteration of app structure and visuals. At the end of our sprint, we were given the opportunity to present our final prototype to guest judges who are UX Designers at Netflix, Microsoft, and Nvidia.
My Role:
I led my team through our Mid-Fidelity sprint where we were able to finalize the overall structure of our app, focusing on developing wireframes based on our "How Might We?" statements. In addition, I worked alongside my team to conduct User Research, Usability Testing, User Experience Design, and Prototyping.
Team:
Lauren Outhabong, Kimberly Tran, Micah Alon, Riju Narang (PM)
Timeline:
Figma, AdobeXD, Google Suite, Zoom
Tools:
April 2022 - May 2022 (6 weeks)
Awards:
Best Prototype
Audience Choice
The Solution
User Research
Competitive Analysis
To start off, our team conducted literature reviews to become familiar with the different platforms that exist for ridesharing. While the top apps in the ride-share industry are Uber and Lyft, university students may gravitate towards cheaper options when traveling longer distances.
Since we were prompted to gain inspiration from the UC Davis Ride-Share Facebook Group, we focused our attention on platforms made solely for the use of students. Our main research goal:
Learn more about the experiences that drivers and riders have had while using the existing UCD Facebook ride-share group.
Quantitative & Qualitative Research
A total of 79 university students were surveyed, 68.8% of which had used the UC Davis Ridesharing group or a similar platform.
Research Synthesis & Affinity Mapping
Pain Points
1. Communication between riders and drivers is difficult and frustrating, especially due to having to switch between multiple apps to keep track of messages and/or payments.
2. Searching for riders/drivers that match one’s preferences is time-consuming and confusion.
3. The establishment of trust between riders and drivers gives students a sense of safety, which is also why current users gravitated toward university rideshare platforms.
The bolded keywords represent common themes that our research participants expressed value in.
Ideation
"How Might We?"...
- Streamline communication between drivers and riders about ride details?
- Create an intuitive way to filter for driver/rider preferences?
- Allow for flexible prices for riders/wages for riders?
- Establish a sense of trust between riders and drivers?
Using these statements, my teammates and I all took the time to indivisually sketch out low-fidelity wireframes. The approach we took was to create frames for each of the statements in order to solve each painpoint.
My low-fidelity sketches
Sketches by my teammates
We found that we had a lot of similar ideas for features that we wanted to include in our app. While it's obvious to fix the pain points of miscommunication with a chat feature or manage preferences with a filter, we kept a few things in mind when deciding on how to implement them.
We continuously questioned why users would use a particular feature and how we could make it the most efficient. For example, although a feature for group chats might seem very straightforward, we wanted to consider how it might be used by people participating in a ride-share. Some questions that come to mind are "Who is in charge of adding or deleting people from the chat? Could this be automatic" or "Should the driver have more control over the chat settings in case there's a change of plans?". After discussing our common solutions, we decided on 7 features to highlight.
1. University Onboarding - Users sign up with their college-issued student ID to ensure that only current students can use the platform.
2. User Profile - Users can link their social media and add interests to personalize and allow others to see mutual connections
3. Filter for Ride Preferences - When searching for rides, users can customize preferences for pick-up & drop-off location, date, time, and price.
4. Requesting to Join a Ride - After picking a driver, riders request to join the trip. Once the driver has accepted them, the user is automatically added to a group chat with the other riders and the driver. If the user wanted to message another rider privately, they would click on their profile and send a message.
5. All the Important Information in One Place (Dashboard) - On the Dashboard, users can find their pending requests, current rides, and past rides all in one place. There will also be a section for announcements, where users will be reminded about payments, chat messages, etc. They can also see and scroll through the explore page.
6. Explore Page - Ask If riders can not find a ride after filtering and looking through driver options, they can post with a description of what they are looking for, and this post will be listed on the explore page. The explore page can be sorted to show either ride offers or requests for rides.
7. Leave Reviews on your Driver or Passengers Profile - Users can heart drivers and riders they enjoyed interacting with. After a ride is complete, users can also leave a review.
Mid-Fidelity
Design System
Components
Final Prototype
Research Insights
-> Students feel safe using the UCD shuttle because it's run by the school and has a sense of credibility
-> Safety was the most important aspect for 2/3 of the Facebook Rideshare users
Solution:
University Onboarding
Emphasizes the sense of trust built around university ride sharing by using college-specific authentication at sign-up. This ensures that the app is being used by students only.
Research Insights
-> There's too much scrolling through different posts about ride offers and people searching for rides
-> The hashtag feature on UCD Facebook group is helpful for filtering out certain riders and drivers
Solution:
Filter for Ride Preferences
Having a filter can ease the process of searching for rides instead of endlessly scrolling through irrelevant posts on the FB group feed.
Research Insights
-> It can get hard to keep track of the people you have already messaged
-> Sometimes drivers don't post updates when spots are taken for their trip
Solution:
Requesting and Saving Rides
Keep track of which rides you've requested in your Dashboard. Save rides for later in case your request is not accepted.
Research Insights
-> Inconvenient to keep switching between Facebook and Messenger to communicate with other students
-> Communication with drivers and other riders can be difficult
Solution:
In-app messaging
Make group communication easier to discuss ride plans and get to know the students you're carpooling with!
Research Insights
-> It's convenient that students in the facebook group can see the public profile of other students and get a sense of what they’re like
-> It's better to ride with drivers who share mutual friends
Solution:
User Profile & Public Reviews
Students can set up a bio and have the option to link to social media. Users can also write driver/rider reviews on each others’ profiles so other students can view information about their past rides.