ParKings by David Pacheco Garcia

Context/Background

ParKings Overview

ParKings is an IOS mobile application that seeks to provide a seamless parking experience by helping drivers save money, time, and effort when searching for parking.

ParKings is part of a 3 month long project for the SMU certification in User Experience Design program.
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Responsibilites

Conducted competitive research and competitive research analysis to find a viable solution to monetize the product.
Designed 2 rounds of user surveys using Google Forms for user insights.
Responsible for the user experience of the owner/parking host side of the application.
Designed UX and UI elements. (wireframes + mockups)
Conducted and recorded moderated in-person usability tests.

Opportunity/Challenge

"How might we create a seamless parking experience?"

Currently, drivers struggle to find parking in urban areas because parking is scarce and unpredictable. In a perfect world, drivers would be able to check parking availability in real time. This would allow for a stress free parking experience that would save drivers time, money, and effort.

$2.6

BILLION A YEAR

is spent by drivers paying parking fines.

30%

OF URBAN CONGESTION

is caused by drivers searching for parking.

Parking statistics. [02]

Solution

For a seamless parking experience!

ParKings is a mobile platform that allows drivers to join an online community, where they are able to view available parking options nearby, reserve parking in advance, and list their parking properties to help add more convenient options to their parking community.

ParKings features. [03] [04] [05] [06]

Outcome

Quantifiable metrics.

90% of usability participants expressed that the app was user friendly and easy to navigate while successfully completing their task.
ParKings landed in the top 10% of scores on the SUS curve according to "Measuring U" with an A letter grade and an average of 85 based on 5 usability test participants.

Scroll for full process
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Research

The current state of parking.

We searched and compiled information related to parking in order to better guide our design efforts. Below is what we uncovered.

* Source - The Impact of Parking Pain in the United States, a research study done by INRIX in 2017.

$20.4

BILLION A YEAR

is spent by drivers to avoid fines.

20

MINUTES ON AVERAGE

is spent per drivers trying to find parking every day.

$2.6

BILLION A YEAR

is spent by drivers on parking fines

30%

OF URBAN CONGESTION

is caused by drivers searching for parking.

Parking statistics. [07]

U.S. National Average

VS.

Dallas, Texas Average

$72.7

BILLION A YEAR

How much it costs Americans to search for parking.

$727

MILLION A YEAR

17

HOURS PER YEAR

Average time Americans spend searching for parking.

$48

HOURS PER YEAR

$345

PER DRIVER

Average amount of money spent on time, fuel, and emissions.

$995

PER DRIVER

Parking statistics. [08]

Empathy Map

How would our users feel?

To better understand what our users might feel, think, say or do during a frustrating parking experience, we conducted an empathy map workshop with the objective to find user pain points and desires.

Since the UX team lived in Dallas-Fort Worth, a very populated city with an emphasis on driving, we understood how painful searching for parking can be. The goal was to empathize with the users in order to better design our interview questions for qualitative results.
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Empathy Map Scenario

"You are going to a concert at the House of Blues in Dallas and you have to look for parking. It's rush hour and you only have enough time to get there. Making it on time to the event is crucial to you."
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Empathy Map Results

The empathy map identified 57 data points. We then studied the patterns and clustered them into 7 themes - Location, Risk, Time, Money, Assistance, Traffic, and Negative Feelings - shown in hot pink sticky notes.

Empathy map displaying a variety of pain points related to parking

Empathy map results. [09]

Empathy map pains + gains. [10]

Pain Points

MONEY
Overpaying for parking.

TIME
Searching for parking is time consuming.

ASSISTANCE
Who can assist with parking?

NEGATIVE FEELINGS
Negative experiences affect the overall journey.

LOCATION
Getting lost!

TRAFFIC
Full parking garages create more traffic.

RISK
Chance to have a negative experience.

Gain Points + Opportunities

Provide affordable parking options.
Provide parking availability.
Provide parking assistance
Provide a positive parking experience.
Provide parking directions.

User Survey

How people REALLY feel about parking.

We designed an online user survey with multiple branching paths that reflected questions regarding their parking experiences. We were able to reach 100 participants giving us plenty of quantitative and qualitative data to analyze.

Quantitative Analysis

Looking at the numbers.

83 out of 100 respondents were located in the Dallas-Fort Worth (DFW) area.
‍
The participants were 65% female and 35% male.
Age range demographics were

16 - 21 (12%)
22 - 30 (71%)
31 - 60 (09%)
Over 61 (06%)

Do you experience stress while trying to find parking?

Do you prepare to find parking or figure it out when you arrive?

On average, how long do you spend time looking for parking in a crowded lot/garage?

Would you rather pay for parking in a convenient place or find free parking even if you have to walk a little?

Do you require handicap parking?
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Have you arrived late to an event due to parking?
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Do you use an app to pay/reserve parking?
‍

Did you know you could pay/reserve through apps?
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User survey results. [11]

Qualitative Analysis

Beyond the numbers.

We designed several survey questions with open ended prompts to get users' opinions related to their parking experiences.

What factors do you consider when looking for parking?

"Price/availability usually comes first. If it’s a walkable distance I don’t worry about it too much."

What would be your ideal parking spot?

"A free spot in a monitored lot that is a walkable distance from my destination."

What was the worst parking experience you’ve had?

"I couldn't find parking. It took me 15 mins and ended up parking far away and someone blocked me in when I wanted to leave."

User survey results. [09]

User Insights

Different users. Similar insights.

The user survey validated most of the pain points discussed after our empathy map exercise.

Pain Points Drivers in DFW reported...

Searching for available parking is stressful.
Fear of getting towed or fined.
Safety is a concern.
Wasting time and being late.
Traffic anxiety.
Parking too far.
Overpaying for parking.
Getting into an accident.

Opportunities Drivers in DFW want...

To be able to check parking availability in real-time.
To be able to reserve parking ahead of time.
To be able to filter parking options by distance, price and availability.
To learn from others about best parking options.
To feel safe where they park.
To save time, money and gas.
To avoid stressing about parking.

Personas

Designing a prototypical user.

To focus our design efforts on a common goal that highlights the specific user needs and goals discovered during the user research phase, we developed personas based on the user data points discovered in the empathy map exercise and validated through our user survey.

The creation of personas would help us foster empathy for and easily remember our target users as we moved forward in our design process.
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Tina, gets low stress from parking by about 12%

Timely Tina

Profile

Tina is a young marketing professional. She constantly finds herself in and out the office to attend meetings and events. She’s very punctual and values everyone’s time. When she’s not at a work event, you’ll find her exploring new social events with her friends.
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Frustrations

Wasting time on parking search.
Being late to a meeting or event.
Parking too far and walking to events.
Overpaying for parking to avoid parking fines.

Career:

Marketing Supervisor

Age:

25

Vehicle:

Honda Accord

Location:

Dallas, TX

Parking Needs

Close and a short walk.
Cheap prices.
Feeling of security.
Planned.

Personality

“I make sure to plan ahead so I’ll have a spot waiting for me when I arrive, not the tow truck.”

Persona A. [12]

Caren in her vehicle, mostly stressed from parking by 56%

Chaotic Caren

Profile

Caren is outgoing, loves being around people and never says no to a last minute get together. She rarely plans her events and loves to go with the flow. She’s always out on weekend nights at popular locations and is always on the hunt for local events in her area.
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Frustrations

Paying for parking.
Having to use valet if parking is full.
Planning for parking.
Tracking metered park time.

Career:

Human Resources

Age:

28

Vehicle:

Wagon

Location:

Plano, TX

Parking Needs

Doesn’t mind walking.
Free spots.
Covered.
Lots of capacity available.

Personality

“I love going to events the day of and don’t talk to me about the parking. We will find it when we get there.”

Persona B. [13]

Product Feasibility

Choosing our battles.

To help prioritize our ideas, we evaluated them using an impact feasibility chart to help us eliminate "low hanging fruit" and only focus on differentiators and performance payoffs.

Impact feasibility chart displaying results

Impact feasibility chart. [14]

No Brainers

1. Parking Information
2. Booking
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Differentiators

3. Parking Host Platform
4. Parking Community
5. Data Collection
6. Reward System
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Performance Payoffs

7. Color Coded Parking Availability on Map
8. Saving Vehicle and Payment Information
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Unwise Ideas

9. Supply the Technology for Accurate Information (ie. Motion Sensors)

Reflections So Far

Research guiding design.

Research is VITAL in the early stages of any design.
Hard data, although half the equation, provides useful insights that can used as evidence to drive design decisions.
Qualitative data analysis can be a little trickier to analyze than quantitative data since it involves more "emotional" responses.
Most of the exercises/workshops not only help in gathering user data, they also help create rapport amongst the team to create a better working dynamic/culture.

Competitive Research

Scoping out the competition!

We examined 2 direct and 2 indirect competitors to help us identify opportunities and gaps to further differentiate our product.
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We asked 4 main questions when analyzing the competition.

Are they a direct or indirect competitor? (Relationship)
What makes then unique? (Differentiator)
What does it lack? (Gap)
How do they generate income? (Profit)

Relationship

Direct competitor

Differentiator

Parking information and bookings

Community for parking

Gaps

No realtime parking availability

No real presence in DFW,
Overwhelming amount of information

Profit

Service fee from parking reservations

Direct competition chart. [15]

Relationship

Indirect competitor

Differentiator

Traffic updates in realtime by the community

Lodging based community with
network of hosts and guests,
Information created by the community

Gaps

Parking system not set up

No parking aspect

Profit

Location based ads and branded pins

Charges a service fee to guests and receives a commission from hosts

Indirect competition chart. [16]

Monetization

Balancing profits + the user experience.

Ads became a solution early in the product's lifecycle. However, it became evident that the amount of information that would be displayed on a mobile device would be overwhelming and adding ads on top of that would take away from the goal of creating a "seamless parking experience."
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Airbnb's monetization strategy became one we quickly saw as a potential example to follow due to its "community" aspect. This would absolve us from the unwise idea of "suppling technology for accurate information" discussed in the impact feasibility chart. Instead, parking hosts would supply their parking location information, thus making our product more accurate and reliable to use.

Waze's realtime user data collection system was borrowed for our product and transformed into the addition of a rewards system/gaming system. The gamification of the product would incentivize users to keep using the app to supply it with accurate realtime data and offer a customizable aspect. Parking hosts and drivers would both be able to benefit from this rewards system and business objectives would be fulfilled.

Product Clarity

Review. Revise. Refocus

ParKings connects drivers and parking space owners to improve the quality of the parking experience.
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Differentiators

Parking Host Platform - Members can list a parking space as small as a driveway in front of their home or as big as a multi-level parking garage in downtown DFW.

Community - Members are able to review and update the availability of parking to help enhance the experience of all drivers.

Rewards System and Gamification - To encourage drivers to engage with the product.

Data Collection - Valuable statistics to help inform businesses and drivers of parking trends.

Monetization + Revenue

Charge a service fee for bookings.

Commissions from listings.

Incentivize business owners to run customizable ads that add to the users needs.

Product Vision + Goals

The main mission.

By making parking information easily accessible via an active community, we aim to ease the stressful experience of finding parking for the everyday driver.
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Goals

Collect credible data to provide reliable parking results.
Create a community that will help alleviate the stress of parking.
Provide real-time parking availability information via community interaction.
Create a reward system within the product to increase user engagement.
Create a platform for parking lot hosts to list their spots.

"A driver should know if a parking lot/garage is available to park at in less than 10 seconds."

How might we statement. [17]

Reflections So Far

Designing a strategy.

Analyzing direct competitors is doing the minimum as it mainly informs you about the present.
Synthesizing ideas from indirect competitors with our own ideas, created a unique design strategy to give us an edge against the competition.
Referencing our overall goal, "creating a seamless parking experience", consistently, helped us avoid solutions that would detract from that main goal.
It is important to keep reworking/updating your product's vision and goals as you move through the design framework to keep the team on the same page.

Feature Ideation

EPIC user stories!

We began to define the user experience by creating Epics (high-level features) and User Stories (users goals) utilizing Trello.

trello board filled with epics and user stories

Epic + user story ideation chart. [18]

Epic + user story ideation examples. [19]

User Workflows

Navigating through user journeys.

Once we defined high-level features, we divided the user workflows amongst the team. Each team member was responsible for designing their assigned workflow, which we then discussed collectively utilizing InVision Freehand and remote video calls. That allowed us to divide and conquer, stay on track and meet our deadline.

I was responsible for designing how our users experience becoming a parking host and adding their parking listing information. Below are some simplified versions of the final workflows.

This exercise was an excellent way for us to shed light on some gaps/opportunities and have necessary discussions regarding important interactions early on in the design process.

user workflows for both driver and parking host

User workflows. [20]

Initial Sketches

Putting ink to paper.

Before digitally designing anything, we needed to quickly explore ideas regarding the products look and feel on a mobile screen - and nothing is faster than a quick sketch.

Below are some of my initial sketches visually translating the workflow of a parking host listing one of their parking locations. You will find my sketches to be color coded to better communicate intention. There is also a lot of talking to myself as you can see from the various sticky notes. I believe this is necessary as there is a lot of information being balanced/considered and you want to create artifacts to look back upon down the line.
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Key

† Anything delineated in red is an interactable element.

‡ Blue text are my thoughts throughout the design process.

ParKings initial sketches. [21]

Early design moves.

Simple layouts are used throughout the on-boarding process to ease and inform the user.
Being a text heavy phase of the app, simple and succinct copy is used to put as little mental strain on the user.
When inputting/editing a parking listing, main navigation and navigation information happens near the top of the screen so that the user's chances of accidentally leaving a screen is low.
Majority of the screen is used for relaying/inputting user information.

ParKings sketches (edited). [22]

Wireframes

Digitally manifesting.

The same workflows were then translated into a more concrete wireframe. During this phase, working with a monochromatic color palette helps focus the designer on user interactions and establishing hierarchies.

Screen layouts are given consistent margins and ratios are established.
Text elements are given sizes as well as weights.
Navigation elements and information architecture are given more consideration to simplify the user experience.
UI elements begin to take shape as well as UI effects.

ParKings wireframes. [23]

Product Style Guide

Creating an ID-entity.

With the overall goal of "creating a seamless parking experience", the look and feel of the product went for a calming and unobtrusive style. A vast amount of information is being relayed to the user, so a goal of avoiding visual frustration and mental stressing design patterns were circumvented.

Proxima Nova was chosen as the main font for its geometric and easy readability qualities.
Blue and green hues are chosen for the overall color palette based on their calming effect on the eyes.
Urgency markers such as buttons and parking lot information icon colors are chosen based on established styles of traffic lights.
Minimal UI iconography is designed to match the font style.
ParKings is chosen as the product's name. The gameficiation aspect plays with the "King" part of the name.

Typography

Iconography

Mood Board

ParKings style guide. [24]

High Fidelity Mockups

Designing a digital experience.

With a style guide complete, the final version of a user adding their parking listing workflow is created.

Screen layouts use a layered design pattern consisting of solid backgrounds, opacity filters, and geometric gradients to visually orient/inform a user of their current place/action as well as give the app a sense of visual depth.
Main app navigation elements are hidden when a listing is currently being created/edited for less distractions/chances of a user accidentally cancelling/exiting their current task.
Text elements and corresponding icons are used together to efficiently communicate information.
UI effects/animations and interaction design/transitions are kept simple to not disorient or surprise the user - the last thing needed in a high stress parking situation.
Call-to-action buttons are given a drop shadow and standard color to visually distinguish themselves from all other elements.

ParKings prototype. [25] [26]

ParKings high-fidelity mockups. [27]

Accessibility Design

Parking equality.

We believe parking availability should be accessible to everyone. Color should not be the only visual cue on the map. As a result, we added patterns to the parking availability markers to address visual deficiencies.

ParKings accessibility audit. [28]

Reflections So Far

ParKings...manifested.

Epics, User Stories and Workflows help filter out elements that a user will not need thus saving resources like time and money.
Designing a style guide helps the team with style consistency. This helps when making future decisions down the line about new elements such as backgrounds, transitions, interactions etc.
A style guide can also be used to communicate design intent to stakeholders for buy in.
Team collaboration and consistent meetings help keep the user experience consistent across multiple workflows. This also helps in fleshing out ideas when one team member would be unsure about certain design decisions.

Usability Testing

Testing ParKings.

In order to identify any design issues and uncover opportunities to improve the prototype, we tested ParKings with users from our target customers.

We conducted usability tests with 5 participants. Each participant tested 2 majors workflows/scenarios and followed the usability test with a System Usability Scale (SUS) Survey.
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Screener Questions

To ensure that the participants were ideal for our target audience, we asked screener questions such as,

Do you prefer to use apps to find parking?
Do you reserve parking online?
How often do you go out to events that require you to use a parking lot/garage?
Do you usually lose track of where you’ve parked?
Do you share your parking location with friends when going to events together?
Do you use apps for reward opportunities?

Remote Moderated Usability Tests - My Role

I was able to conduct 2 in person tests while the rest of the team joined via Zoom. The other 3 tests were remote due to COVID-19 restrictions.
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Each test had a facilitator, a moderator, 2 observers and lasted about 20 minutes.

Person holding a phone displaying our application on the screen

Testing ParKings. [29]

Individual - Scenario 01

"You will be attending a large social event next month at Sundance Square in Fort Worth. Knowing that the area is pretty tight on parking and many people will be attending, you look into reserving a parking spot. You search for parking applications and find ParKings and download it. You then open the app for the first time as a new user."

Task 01 - Create a new account as an individaul.
Task 02 - Set up your profile by adding your vehicle information.
Task 03 - Search for parking near Sundance Square, apply 2 filters (price and wheelchair accessibility) then book the available garage you can find.
Task 04 - Add reservation to your calendar then view your reservation and get directions.
Task 05 - Mark your spot when you get there to earn points.

Business/Parking Host - Scenario 02

"You live in a neighborhood next to a popular shopping area in Fort Worth. There is always traffic and people are parking down the streets due to the lack of proper parking. you decided that you want to list your driveway as the parking spot for some extra cash due to the high demand. You search for parking applications and find ParKings and download it. You then open the app for the first time as a new lot owner."

Task 01 - Create a new account for your business for a residential driveway.
Task 02 - Add compact spaces in additional information and save the draft after you've added a photo. Go to your homepage.
Task 03 - Now access the listing you were working on and continue editing.
Task 04 - Publish your residential listing.
Task 05 - Edit the pricing on your Sundance Parking Garage 02 listing.

Test Results

First Impressions

"Very sleek, pretty user friendly"

Courtney, Usability Tester

"I think it's sleek. I like that it's not blocky and it's easy to use."

Cody, Usability Tester

"It's very well put together, easy to read and maneuver to find parking."

Lonnie, Usability Tester

Test Results - System Usability Scale (SUS) Survey

ParKings prototype scored an average of 85 based on 5 usability test participants. It landed in the top 10% of scores on the SUS curve with an A letter grade according to (MeasuringU).
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SUS Survey results. [30]

Constructive Feedback

Possible Improvements

Below is a video of a collection of snippets from our users’ interactions with the product, their thoughts and behavior.
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ParKings usability testing video. [31]

Possible Improvements

For a better user experience.

ParKings improvements. [32]

Reflections + Conclusion

Lessons Learned

Creating a project roadmap early in a project and establishing well-defined high level goals, will help the team "fail fast" and move forward.
Establishing rapport with product team early on in the project helps individual and team motivation and offer an overall better work culture.
Research is essential to guide both strategy and design.
Testing with real users will teach you how to improve and sell the best needed version of your product.

Next Steps

Implement and test prototype improvments based on the usability tests findings.
Invest more time and effort on user research and testing regarding the business/parking host/owner workflow.