Communicating movement to a city
Role
Product Designer for Motivate (operators of Citi Bike)
Impact
14% increase in one-time riders and coverage in the New York Times Magazine
Summary
Citi Bike is a public bicycle sharing system in New York City. Visitors and residents of New York can get memberships or one-time rides through an app or physical kiosks located in front of every bike dock. As a central source of information located around the city about the system, the kiosks are a vital entry point for new riders. Amy Wu and I redesigned the kiosk informational panel to be a universal how-to guide for the Citi Bike system.
The final design was installed on 330+ kiosks throughout New York City and ridership amongst one-time users increased by 14% (compared to the previous month). Our work was featured in the New York Times Magazine.
Old and wordy
New and illustritive
Listening to all potential customers
New York City is home to and a destination for people from all over the world and the Citi Bike system is meant to serve all of them that are able to ride a bike, no matter what language they speak. The original design required reading directions in English. We therefore identified the informational panel as a high impact and low effort intervention to improve Citi Bike's user experience.
We performed primary research, observing and interviewing customers while they took out a bike for the first time and found that first time users had difficulty at every stage of taking out a bike. It was clear that the panel needed to be completed stripped down and redesigned with very clear step-by-step instructions.
We identified how to build a better information architecture through clearly delineating steps and improved legibility with a illustrated visual design language. Each design iteration was tested in the field with prototypes and questionnaires.
The final design focused on illustrations that walk users through the bike rental process, condensing and translating what had been large blocks of text into universally understood directions and pricing table.
Ride alongs
We continually spoke to, observed, and interviewed customers while they took out a bike for the first time and found that they had difficulty at every stage of the process. It was clear that the panel needed to be completely redesigned.
Through constant iteration and testing, we identified how to build a better information architecture through clearly delineating steps and improved legibility with an illustrated visual design language.
Deploying to all potential customers
Our design condenses and translates what had been large blocks of text into universal illustrated directions and a streamlined pricing table, walking users thoughtfully through the bike rental process. Our final iteration lead to the quickest rental process with the least questions asked in 92% of our tests.
