When I was in my second year of college, GO Transit had an app created with Ryerson to let users access schedules for GO buses and trains, along with the ability to look at bus stops and stations. (Note: This app has now retired.) As a commuter, I used this app, but noticed that it wasn’t very functional beyond the ability to look at schedules.
In fact, only half of the buttons on the app worked. So I redesigned the app for a class that required me to gather research, interview users who used the GO Transit, create wireframes and finally, mockup a final design.
Despite enjoying the project’s process, I disliked how I completed each of the deliverables. Therefore, this case study is about what I would do if I could go back: as a better designer now, I gave myself the chance to redesign a good project.
The first step that I always take when I’m faced with an UX project is research. I don’t think about design until I have the facts, so I interviewed nine users who used the GO Transit system. You can view the raw interview data HERE.
Important variables such as Time, Comfort, Frequency and Lateness produced a spectrum of mostly positive data: users commuted for less than 30 minutes or to an upwards of 2 hours. Sometimes the transit system made them late. Most users felt comfortable riding the bus or train, and would sleep on long rides. They liked to use PRESTO and felt that it was convenient to use the GO Transit system.
With this in mind, I looked at the app store reviews. Most of them were low, stating that the app had trouble working, needed to have reminders for bus delays, and that half the buttons did not work. Nearly all the recent reviews had been negative. I noted all the troubles that the reviews pointed out.
When I had created this project the first time around, each persona had a long biography that had not reflected any of the obstacles that I was solving. I felt this was a mistake and based on the interviews, I created two personas to reflect the obstacles that the interviews had revealed, and got rid of the long biography.
After I’d designed the personas and clearly stated down what their needs were, I looked at the original wireframe flow I’d created. I was prepared to change it if it did not accurately represent what the users needed from the app.
However, the original wireframe flow still reflected what the user needed: the ability to look at accurate bus schedules, save the buses that they use, and turn on alerts, especially disruption alerts.
Users needed these things to have a commute that would allow them to get to where they needed to be without feeling rushed or irritated.
The only major change I made to the wireframes was adjusting the buttons on the homepage. The original redesign had no order to the buttons, nor did the order match the items menu.
I took the rounded button design from the original GO Transit app and incorporated it into the new homepage design. I also fixed the order of the buttons on both the homepage and the menu for consistency.
The colour palette was taken from the GO Transit green branding. I kept the original green hue instead of the redesigned brighter green that they use now, because this project’s data is from a few years ago. Had I completely redesigned the entire project, and redone the interviews, I’m positive that the final mockup design would be much different, to reflect updated user concerns and obstacles.
