Kano Castleberry Portfolio

Work

About

Redesigned a parking app to resolve user pain points.

Role

UX Designer

Team

4 UX Designers

1 Project Manager

Timeline

8 weeks (Spring 2024)

Tools Used

Figma

Background

In the spring of 2024, UC Davis hired four UX design students to create a redesign of the AMP Park app. Our redesign aimed to address user's feedback about the app.

Problem

AggiePark via the AMP Park app makes it easy to pay for parking at UC Davis right from your phone. However, the app has received a lot of feedback from users that want to see improvement. With that in mind, we were tasked with demonstrating how these improvements could be implemented into the AMP Park app.

Our main goal was to address user concerns and improve the interface to promote accessibility. We aimed to create a scaleable product with other campuses and cities in mind, as the app is growing and being used on several different campuses.

Results

Our team presented our research findings and designs to a team of stakeholders from the AMP Park app. Currently, two of the features that we pitched (repurchasing parking passes & adding a default vehicle) have been implemented into the AMP Park app.

Background

In the spring of 2024, UC Davis hired four UX design students to create a redesign of the AMP Park app. Our redesign aimed to address user's feedback about the app.

Problem

Results

Research Methods

Competitive Analysis

Understanding industry trends and patterns

Surveys, Interviews, Focus Groups

Gathering insights from students, staff, and campus visitors

User Testing

Analyzing user behavior and pain points

Competitive Analysis

In our competitive analysis, we looked at the strengths and weaknesses of other parking apps. We also looked at Google Maps and Apple Maps to see how they format their map design. We found that AMP could benefit from an onboarding process and an improved map design.

Survey Interviews

12 users interviewed

Users reported wanting an easy way to repurchase the same parking zone every day, experiencing security concerns, and feeling confused with navigating the map.

“The app design is lacking in many areas...The payment experience is severely lacking in clarity. Why should I trust it?”    

“It’s hard to find certain spots because all the lots are bundled up together. I wish it was easier to find the right parking lot.”  

Usability Tests

8 users tested

We asked users to complete 3 tasks: find a parking zone, search for parking near specific campus locations, and go through the payment process.

7 out of 8

found it confusing to find parking zones on the map

50%

struggled with pricing & location services due to lack of instruction

Many were unsure where to begin the process of paying for parking

Affinity Mapping

Pain points found:

Users felt unsafe using the app. Many users felt unsafe adding and storing their payment information with the app, primarily due to the outdated looking interface and lack of information and transparency about user data.
Users were frustrated by confusing interfaces. Oftentimes, users completely missed buttons or callouts because they weren’t visible enough.
Users wanted more personalization. Users expressed wanting a way to quickly purchase the same parking pass each day

Final Prototyping

Onboarding

By adding an onboarding flow we aimed to alleviate users safety concerns about AMP Park. We also gave users the option to immediately create their account.

Location Browsing

We simplified the map appearance by having users select their parking lot, rather than displaying every zone within each lot. Also users can now search by campus locations, rather than just by parking zone type.

Paying for Parking

We created stronger visual hierarchy to make calls to action more visible. We also offered multiple payment methods and the ability to change vehicles, offering more personalization and convenience for users.

Personalized Profile

In the profile, users can add new vehicles, set their default vehicle, and add new credit card information. This is especially important for faculty/staff that share vehicles and payment methods with their spouses.

Takeaways

📡 Communicating with stakeholders

This project is significant to me because it was my first "real-world" UX design project. After completing our design, our final task was to present our work to stakeholders at AMP Park. This group of stakeholders included business professionals and programmers. Prior to presenting, we planned how we wanted to carefully communicate our research findings and our design suggestions. We navigated presenting a redesign in a way that remained respectful to their original project and using language that non-designers could easily pick up on.

🤝 Design and business go hand-in-hand

In doing this project, I learned how to think deeply about design aspects that I had never had to consider before, such as business constraints and scaleability of the product. Before beginning on our design, we clarified that our project needed to follow the branding guidelines of AMP Park. Also, since AMP Park is used on other campuses, our features had to be applicable to any location.

👥 Learn from those around you

On this project, I was lucky to work with very talented designers that had previous experience working with businesses and stakeholders. I definitely learned a lot from observing the language they used and the leadership skills they exhibited.