The first mixed reality transport app and portal designed to improve the needs of older adults and vulnerable passengers
As part of the Design Leadership team at the Design Age Institute, Royal College of Arts, I worked with tech innovators Briteyellow to manage and spearhead an evidence based train travel guidance app.
Research revealed 14 million older adults & individuals with limited mobility were concerned about accessibility, with train travel and navigation being a major source of anxiety.
Briteyellow had the vision to better support these groups, by offering an intuitive, safe, and easy to use travel planning & navigation solution.
My focus was guiding Briteyellow in, getting stronger design impact, creating the app & web portal, developing the brand direction, and designing an evidence-based prototype to present the business case to their primary customer - Transport For Wales. I coached this tech-first team through a user-centered design approach while ensuring we delivered on time and within budget.
*Some of this work is under NDA and cannot be shared in public. Below is an insight of the approach, learnings and outcomes. Please get in touch for more information. Over time, more can be found on Briteyellow. & Briteway.
Outcomes
• Secured six commercial bids with Transport for Wales for roll-out in Wales, plus ten additional stations across the UK
• New guidance app and web portal to be launched in 2024 driven by user insights.
• App praised for inclusivity and innovation, enhancing travel for older adults and vulnerable individuals within a traditional industry
• Increased design value within the tech focused team, with future budgets allocated to both Design & Research.
What I did
• Mentored and cultivated design maturity growth in the team
• Transitioned a tech company from product-focused to user-focused mindset via coaching
• Supported usability testing and translation of user insights into design actions
• Championed for the voice of the user across all UX areas: Wireframing, User Flows, Personas, AR Principles, App Structure, Brand direction (UI)
Briteyellow's strategic business goal was to get their solution adopted nationwide by every operator. The first objective, was to build a business case for the Department of Transport Wales, and the Rail Delivery Group.
Throughout this project, we encountered several obstacles:
• Balancing technical performance with user needs
• Strained relationships between stakeholders
• Integrating diverse technologies and capabilities
• Meeting an accelerated timeline driven by business case requirements
Designing to improve lives of the older adults and the vulnerable
Briteyellow were keen to move quickly to meet commercial bid deadlines. Together we drafted a project plan including, contractual milestone deliverables, design activities, allocated budgets and signed agreements that would help us all to focus and move quickly. To succeed, we needed to gain momentum fast in the first four weeks.
As a team, Briteyellow excelled technically, but had low expertise in user experience, user research, and brand positioning.
I shortlisted suitable external design support, enhancing the team's capabilities. We sent out six design briefs and interviewed three design agencies. After careful review, Brightyellow selected one based on their immediate availability, rapport, and focus on brand strategy and product positioning - a gap they believed would strongly aid pitching the business case.
I questioned their choice, based on the product also needing capabilities of digital AR to further optimize its usability and accessibility. I proposed a strategy to first build a great product experience, then develop the brand. The team decided to leverage contractors for this additional capability later in the project.
Assembling Team Roles
With external design support on board, we were now under tight deadlines! By prioritizing rapid execution, effective communication, and collaboration, our approach included both face-to-face and online interactions, alongside scheduled design and user research workshops. I advocated and implemented weekly catch-ups across all three teams and continuous dialogue via Zoom or email to ensure progress.
Project Plan
To start the discovery phase, I immersed myself into the existing product. Having a critical look at what was in place and why. I quickly understood that The product's technical language and navigation structure were not user-friendly. Throughout the entire experience, people could be left with little information about the context, given little reassurance or confirmation, and no way finding was provided to facilitate intentions. This was all while being a vulnerable person trying to plan a journey or navigate through physical train stations, with ample opportunity for external distractions to interfere. Additionally, I was surprised to find from quick tests people felt the experience was 'technical' or 'unusable' and concerned they may fail at any stage.
There was a clear need to develop empathy, and readdress the experience from a user's perspective, focusing on usability and accessibility.
As a wider multi-company team, we started the design process by planning an on-site user workshop. I took the approach of coaching the Briteyellow team, shifting their mindsets from, tech first to human first. For each full day workshop we, recruited 6-12 older adults, defined 3–4 user observation activities with prototypes and grouped our questions. A key focus of mine was to ensure unbiased questioning, rephrasing binary yes/no questions into "why," "how," or "tell me..." prompts to help us explore the problem space.
Key Questions Included:
• Tell me a typical situation/scenario where you would want or need to use Briteway?
• What kind of features or key activities would you like the product to prioritise?
• What did you think of the process of using AR?
• How did you find your experience of finding and navigating through all the features?
• Why did you make that action, what was your intention or expectation at that time?
• What barriers do you foresee in using this app more frequently?
Having recognized a commercial need to consider the product's emotional impact and how it should feel, the first workshop included word-quality association questions (Pic below).
I would continue to guide across all 4 user workshops throughout the project, as a way to align on the user insights, brainstorm creative solutions and ensure the final experience met user needs.
Research and testing continued to show that the Briteyellow team being heavily focused on technical and business requirements was the problem preventing them from achieving their goal - to drive revenue and growth. Ultimately through delivering a product that provides an easier, better, easier train travel experience.
Summarised learnings:
The 1st user workshop re-confirmed the need for clearer navigation and contextural guidance. We learnt older adults saw product value if the final version was perceived as a "Navigational Insight Tool" or "Knowledgeable Travel Companion."
Word association activities revealed people desired to feel:
• Reassured: Reducing anxiety and stress by providing visibility of station layouts, platform locations, obstacle-free access, crowd levels, and avoiding unmanned entrances or barriers.
• Empowered: Offering easy-to-digest information for confident travel.
• Supported: Providing tailored assistance for the journey and emergency connections.
In the 2nd user workshop, we learnt people preferred the improved app restructure. Discussions led to new findings such as a need for comprehensive travel information, including platform arrival details, and time estimates for changing between platforms based on accessibility needs.
Older adults were also keen to have in-app chat feature which would be valuable to support unmanned stations, or prepare boarding ramps for wheelchairs on arrival.
The 3rd user workshop revealed that the context of train travel held diverse meanings for different individuals. Peoples preferences, priorities and accessibility needs hinted at distinctly different product requirements within the older adult & vulnerable audience. The Briteyellow team needed further clarity on their specific niche older audience.
For instance; those who travelled with elderly parents had different needs compared to older adults who travel independently, or those who were accustomed to being home bound. This diversity posed a challenge in prioritizing app features and defining our product's requirements for launch.
The 4th user workshop signified the commercial business need for ownership of, and full software integration to deliver a better user experience. Despite best efforts with limited funds and internal developers, people still had mixed behaviours across the merging of three software platforms (Unity, Matterport & Mapbox). Consistency of behavioural interactions, button placements and the UI was now limited. Additionally, the duplication of facility lists due to the merge caused people confusion in use.
We also recognised the real-life importance of step-free routing on-site. Since arrival platforms can change unexpectedly, in-app advance alerts to re-route vulnerable users would help reduce passenger stress.
I led the Briteyellow team through several design tools and frameworks, leveraging insights from our user workshops. My goal was to rapidly enable them to make design & product development decisions from the end user's perspective and ultimately develop an innovative solution to the key customer pain points.
I guided the team through user persona creation (pic below) to better understand how their target user needs and product requirements shift depending on user type and wider context. It was important to get the team to develop a clearer picture of whom the first product would target in the early stages. After creation, the team referenced their chosen persona in discussions to steer alignment, make decisions and further develop empathy.
The behavioural variables we identified to segment the older adult audience included:
• Attitude towards travelling & exploring new places
• Home bound VS Independent (limited mobility or restricted health)
• Comfort and exposure to new technologies
*Details intentionally blurred
I led the team to map the customer journey to form a shared understanding of their customer goals based on the established journey, determined key user activities, and to better align on the overall flow of the product & portal user experience.
To avoid complexity and to facilitate stronger mentoring to the team, we simplified the full journey into five stages. This tool was later used by the team to self identify technical build risks impacting the customer journey for MVP.
*Details intentionally blurred
I facilitated an MVP team workshop. It was important to focus the team's efforts on alignment, and prioritize the growing list of feature and functionality ideas for their first commercial release. I educated and worked closely with Briteyellow on the MoSCoW method (Must Have, Should Have, Could Have, Won’t Have) and move us forward with the product redesign.
*Details intentionally blurred
Lastly, I led the team in creating a site map to support them in visualising how people would navigate through the products screens and directly see how individual pages created relate and connect, impacting the holistic user's flow. As the most explicit document, this quickly became the team's most used asset during technical build discussions, mitigating risks on project timelines, technology requirement impacts.
*Details intentionally blurred
Our design process began with restructuring the experience and app architecture; driven by user insights from the first workshop. We defined the product and activities into clear two halves;
• Planning a journey: Everything to do with people researching, preparing, and exploring a train journey.
• Making a journey: Everything related to needs and experiences on-site while in a train station.
The app now begins with a simple option: people can navigate the two areas and access relevant supportive content within each section, including video tours, chat support, facilities, booking train tickets, and reaching out for an emergency contract. Interactions with the Briteway app were pushed to be consistent across both the AR & UX functionality, giving the user a sense of control and predictability throughout a complex process (Pic below)
A critical part of the project was accessibility, ensuring the app and web portal are usable by older adults and vulnerable individuals. We redesigned each screen's layout adding larger touch zones, drop-down menus, increased typography size and added commonly recognized icons to ease navigation. High contrast text on a plain, light background was used to give focus on functions, images, and navigation, so that nothing detracted from the experience. Activ Grotesk font was chosen for its functionality, variety of weights, and suitable legibility across devices and browsers meeting accessibility guidelines.
"This is a step forward, a vast improvement on the previous version".
"The whole thing is 100% better and much more user-friendly."
"This feels like a higher standard product."
- Participant quotes
Enhancements agreed for future releases included:
Adaptable larger text options, voice commands, audio feedback, and simple haptic navigation to remove the reliance for people on looking at the screen in dynamic physical surroundings. All aimed at better supporting accessibility for older adults and vulnerable individuals.
As part of the business case app development, I contributed in guiding Briteyellow to develop their brand strategy, including the icons, colour palette and interface components.
Building on user insights, Briteway is designed to feel like a companion, so a confident tone of voice with simple, easy-to digest language communicate approachable, human qualities. A contemporary, trustworthy sans serif font compliments and balances the style.
All icons, UI elements, and custom illustrations are consistently designed to highlight the subtle human elements, giving the brand a unique, trusted character, and avoiding triggering negative stereotypes that may result in anxiety or ageism.
The product is designed to be scalable and evolve over time, with a future-proof roadmap of features that would truly elevate in the transport market.
Together we created a product that thoughtfully puts the users’ emotional, physical and cognitive wellbeing at the centre of attention, while providing reassurance, and a later released version including 24-7 rail chat support throughout the journey.
