MY ROLE
Product Designer
TIMELINE
3 Months
TEAM
SKILLS
"I had to pay a $60 Uber ride to class because I missed my bus this morning."
- Sad Commuter Student :(
Overview
The GBDA program at the University of Waterloo is located at UWaterloo's Stratford campus. Over the years, students faced challenges in commuting to class, as many did not have access to cars or convenient bus routes to Stratford.
Recently, the university introduced a bus program for student commutes to/from Stratford. However, this program presents limitations as it offers only one daily departure from Stratford/Waterloo, which does not accommodate the varying schedules of students.
Currently, no other solutions exist.
FIG 1.
GBDA Students trying to find a ride for class on Discord...
Interviewing Students' Commuting Experiences
We conducted various interviews with different types of GBDA commuters, including 1 alumni to understand the ongoing issues that students have been facing.
Drivers
Carpoolers
Every student we interviewed addressed the same concerns regarding:
Affordability
Reliability
Safety
The majority of the GBDA community lives in Waterloo and are required to commute to Stratford. But, commuting for GBDA students is unreliable and disorganized.
Through the interviews there was a common pattern between students. Typically, students carpool three days a week in groups of four due to cost-saving and eco-friendly motives. However, they face coordination challenges and safety concerns. Some students feel uneasy carpooling with strangers due to safety concerns.
Who Is Effected by This Problem?
Professors
If students are often absent or late due to transportation issues, it might disrupt the classroom atmosphere.
GBDA Students
Flawed transportation options can affect students' overall academic performance and well-being.
University Administration
To keep academic activities running smoothly, they need to deal with transportation problems.
Constraints
Value tensions existed between drivers and riders.
FIG 2.
Navigating value tensions…
Defining App Requirements Based on User Research
After interviewing commuters and defining their main pain points to the existing options they are able to take to commute, we broke down possible features to be included in our app into categories from most important to least and what to avoid to ensure that the app we are creating actually solves commuter's pain points.
"How might we create an affordable, reliable, and safe ride-sharing platform for commuting GBDA students?"
Introducing StratShare
Currently, there are no existing solutions or organized methods created by the University of Waterloo to address the challenges faced by GBDA commuter students regarding reliability, safety, and affordability. StratShare resolves these concerns.
🆘 Emergency Feature
Upon the driver's arrival to pick up the student, if the student feels unsafe, they can easily access an Emergency button at any point of their trip. This button provides pre-generated information about the destination and driver, which can be sent to 911 or any designated contact immediately.
Issue Addressed — Safety
Safety was a crucial concern for students when carpooling with other students as they may not know them or do not feel comfortable.
🗓️ Schedule Matching
Upon signing up, students can synchronize their UWaterloo schedule from their portal to align with drivers/passengers who share similar schedules. This eliminates the need for students to spend time searching for a driver/passenger for each individual class.
Issue Addressed — Organization & Reliability
Students expressed difficulty in spending time finding rides for each of their individual classes by asking their peers. This feature eliminates that need by providing all available options at once.
🗓️ Customizable Profile
A customizable public-facing profile gives users control over how much information they want to share.
Issue Addressed — Trust & Cooperation
Conflicts existed between building trust with riders and protecting drivers' privacy.
☑️ UW Verification
Upon signing up, both drivers and passengers must connect with their UWaterloo account to verify that they are students.
Issue Addressed — Safety
As StratShare is an app for UWaterloo commuters, the feature guarantees that both passengers and drivers are UWaterloo students, effectively eliminating any risk of scams.
🚘 Flexible Booking
StratShare's booking system allows flexibility, whether it's from a single spot or joining a carpool group to save money. This system also accommodates flexible departure options such as one-way or round-trip, weekly rides at any time of the day.
Issue Addressed — Affordability & Reliability
The current options with the bus program and carpooling with peers lack flexibility due to limited departure times.
💬 Passenger/Driver Messaging
The app features a "Messages" tab that allows students to communicate with any previous or current drivers/passengers.
Issue Addressed — Reliability
Students expressed the importance of being able to communicate with their driver/passenger in the case of any changes that arise. For example, running late.
