Weekly Design Problem #2— Mobile MetroCard
Prompt #2
The NYC metrocard system has remained unchanged for decades. The cost of the metrocard machine infrastructure, the lost time of waiting in line to buy a metrocard, touching a dirty machine to do it, the potential of losing the metrocard, and the ease of gaming the system by swiping your card for others has cost the city millions of dollars and leaves much to be desired from the user experience.
Design a new system that allows a daily user who uses the metro everyday or an-out-of-town visitor who will use the metro just once to get access to the metro, on time, without having a physical NYC metrocard on hand.
Challenge (an important note)
The solution I came up with for this week is what I believe a temporary solution and also the most feasible solution that can be implemented immediately. I continued the project this way because I wanted to emulate a design project that needed to have immediate effect (like in some real life work conditions).
However, in reality, the most difficult part of this project was figuring out how to eliminate the flaw in which users would sometimes have to tap/ swipe several times on a terminal before getting through. This made me believe that maybe there is an entirely different system required because maybe the problem is bigger than just having to swipe a card several times and that the system of using an object to allow you through a gate is outdated.
Logistics
Demographic: Everyday NYC Metrocard users + tourists who will use it for the first time and a limited amount.
User Goal: Use the metro system effortlessly without a card
Constraints:
1. Tourists have many different languages
2. Limited time to get through turnstile
Research
The current system
Never having used the NYC metrosystem, I had no idea how the current system looked. By researching articles of people interviewing users and their feelings toward the metrocard system as well as youtube tutorials on how to buy and use metrocards, it was evident why this system had its flaws. First of all, to those who don’t know, there are two separate systems- first, users have to buy a metrocard on a machine (the same machine they use to refill the card) and then they use the card from the machine to swipe at a terminal to get through to the actual metrosystem.
Competitive Analysis
Around the world there are several places with well-developed public transportation. I looked into the metrosystem of three countries: Japan, Korea, and Beijing and they all had similar standards of how their system worked. They all have available metrocards that they use to get through the terminals: while Korea and Japan tap the card, Beijing has the similar motion to NYC of swiping it. All three still have the difficulty of sometimes having to do the motion several times before getting through. Additionally, Korea’s screen tells the user how much the current ride is and how much balance is left in the card.
User Needs
1. Low learning curve for understanding how to use it
2. Minimized number of systems to use when going through the metrosystem
3. A quick method of getting through to their desired subway station
4. A more sanitary way of buying and using their card
Final Design Decisions
Mostly Images (minimal text)
To account for the idea that lots of tourists from all over the world may be using this, I tried making the app more universally easy to understand by using commonly understood symbols.
Showing the Image of the Card
Although in reality, the entire screen is actually detectable by the machine and the image of the metrocard is obsolete, it is there for the user. People like visualizing and seeing the object they are using so this is simply to match the user’s mental model of what they are scanning on the terminal.
Balance
In order to establish transparency, trust, and convenience with this app, I provided the balance of what the card has at the top right screen of the card.
Tapping at the Gate
I chose to make this app a tapping motion with the gate as opposed to a swiping motion. First of all, this is a more simple motion so it’s less likely that there are variants in the way people will do this and cause error on the system (making them do it several times). Additionally, it’s a quicker motion so feedback from the terminal will be quicker in telling them whether or not they can pass.
Final App Design
System-App Interaction
