Challenge
In many countries of Latin American, like the Dominican Republic, commuting in public transport is a challenge, considering that it's a cheaper method compared to Uber and other driver booking services.
It used to be very difficult for many people to know what kind of public buses and taxis they need, to reach somewhere, and to know how much time and money they will spend.
Usually, we meet people that have to go somewhere with public transportation, but they don’t know which kind of buses or taxis they need to take, and where they can take them.
Our goal
Create a mobile app that helps people to know which public buses and taxis they need to take.
Possible features
Talking with some users about their needs provides me an overview of what kind of features could help them to achieve their goal and provide them a good experience.
Wireframing
After analyzing the user needs and other stuff, I started with some quick sketches and continued with creating high-fidelity mockups. Using wireframe helps me to make the design process iterative, instead of trying to combine the functionality and creative aspects of the app in one step.
Style Guide
After that, the next step was to define a sexy and polished style guide and components based on the brand guidelines. These colors should define the product and make the target audience feel comfortable and identified.
Look & Feel
Let's put everything together and take a look at every screen of the app.
Getting recommended routes at public transport:
In the next screens, you could find two little pictures, one for identification and another one for indication. The first one refers to the sign that every public transportation must have at the roof, and it will help the users to identify what public bus or taxi they need to take. The last one refers to the gesture the user can do to call the attention of the driver.
Being able to find recommended routes even when you don't have a net connection:
Get started screen and notification center to keep updated of new stuff:
Results
I got a lot of fun in this experiment. Also, I learned a lot by watching our test users use and fumble through the app. This helps me to identify areas, where the app is not clear enough.
The next step is to iterate every time it's necessary until the users could achieve their goal.