A RED Academy UX Case Study on cycling safety
In Toronto the cycling scene is as alive as the city itself. Our class was challenged to discover ways to help make Toronto a better place, and channel that goal through Education, Health, Wellness, Safety, and community. I choose to instead look for a problem and take it from there, and that led me to a focus on safety.
Our first in-class exercise was to partner up, choose a problem from a quick 10 minute brainstorm session, so my classmate and I jumped in to and see what problems we could identify surrounding safety in Toronto. Looking back it’s interesting to think about the different paths we took. Here’s what we jotted down.

Thanks to the process, a simple exercise gave way to the task I would set for myself for the next three months. My classmate went on to study the pedestrian navigation experience and I wanted to explore cycling navigation experience.
But how did I get to my solution? Because my first ideas certainly didn’t lead me to the final realizations you’ll soon find here.
I started by talking to the most frequent cyclists I knew: Hesam, Peter, and Matt about this project and my hope to really take in the concepts, methodologies and throw myself into the process as best I could. Aesthetics were secondary on my mind and resisting the urge to unleash the full force of my illustration and graphic design talents was needless to say very hard.
So while enjoying several delicious dishes for dinner at Toronto’s Sukho Thai, I explained what I was up to at RED Academy. What followed that evening was an email exchange with my friend Hesam, and he shared his thoughts on his time as an avid cyclist in this city, and three articles about the existence, use, and hopeful measured integration of the laneways and alleyways that exist in Toronto. After reading these, I too wondered if these articles contained the keys to the answers I needed to build my solution.


“Back alleys, neglected courtyards, and stairways may escape our notice…yet if they are claimed, and owned, and developed, they can be harnessed to strengthen and enrich their communities.”
- Placemaking and the Future of Cities, Project for Public Spaces
http://dandyhorsemagazine.com/blog/2012/05/14/torontos-laneways-offer-hidden-gems-to-cyclists/

Pouring over these hidden gems and cycling around the paths surrounding Trinity-Bellwoods park, I could see what the potential these groups, and people like Hesam were envisioning. Hesam pondered what it would be like if we could “use cameras and sensors to manage traffic flow”. Could we “use smartphones to assist us move through these maze-like spaces safely?”
“What is the rider experience and the driver experience to make use of these laneways?”.
Powerful and exciting questions for sure, but I needed to know more.

From here I talked my other good friends Matt and Peter, taking in their perspectives and constructing the Google questionnaire/survey I would be using to canvas as many people I could reach using Facebook groups, Twitter and Instagram groups. Facebook proved to be the most fruitful channel to engage users and also served as the platform I would use to also conduct my 1–1 interviews via Video Chat. No small task, but I spoke with three people over Facebook video, and came back with learned that:

My first conversation completely blew away my own temperature check on the current state of cycling affairs in the city and showed me just how real the threat is that cyclists face every day. Personally, my own cycling experience in Toronto has been uneventful as I prefer to remain within residential neighborhoods for as long as possible to avoid busy roads, but my experience alone was just one story.
Interview one: Frequent cyclist Dorian, plans routes, uses a bike as main mode of transportation, “D” cannot rely on TTC, uses google maps to plan ahead and understand where they need to go as well as tapping into crowd sourced maps of the city, D has experienced numerous encounters of driver aggression while on roads. Very comfortable with his bike handling skills.
Interview two: Frequent cyclist Lindsay, cycles 6 days a week, only just transitioned to major cycling this year and the primary use is to get to and from work. “L” plans their routes with the google ecosystem, and pushes directions to their phone. They haven’t encountered aggressive drivers but potholes and construction tend to be the major pain point along their routes. Comfortable with their bike handling skills.
Interview three: Frequent cyclist Mike, plans his preferred routes and sticks to the safest ones due to high traffic aggression and personal experience with accidents. Over the years entering adulthood he began to use cycling increasingly, and he prefers side streets to bike lanes. He’s had interactions with people who think there aren’t alternatives to main roads, and avoid cycling altogether out of fear.
Interview four: Avid cyclist Garth, cycled to and from work for four years straight until 2012, through all seasons. He would modify and tweak his routes on the fly as he would progress and isolate his most favored routes that way. Similarly to Lindsay, Garth faced more difficulties facing road construct and potholes than insensitive drivers. In his experience he felt a mutual respect between himself and other drivers.
Interview five: Avid cyclist Matt, cycles to and from work in the spring through to fall, and having lived in Toronto he’s been cycling for over 20 years and so he knows the region inside and out. He doesn’t need to plan routes ahead of time, and is also comfortable exploring with minimal use of alleyways unless he’s already familiar with their connections and knows it’s won’t be too much of safety risk. In response to the relationship between himself and cars, they tend to “get in the way” and traffic is too bothersome. Instead he prefers to use side streets. As a frequent cyclist that has colleagues and friends that are very connected to the bike scene/community in Toronto, they’re all quite wary of drivers, and too many have been involved in all sorts of accidents from minor to severe. Many incidents resulting in personal injuries occurring while trying to avoid pedestrians wandering into the roads, into bike lanes/roads.



Answers collected from survey takers, painted a clear picture that improvements could still be made for cyclists in both the physical spaces they move through, and using accessories and tools they control as they ride. And my first thoughts about creating a lead and follow ecosystem for strong, mid level and inexperienced riders (patterned slightly after Strava’s community approach to tracking GPS recorded routes) could assist and help prepare casual cyclists to move through high traffic environments. But I quickly changed my mind since my focus was navigation, not technical riding instructions.
I made a list of features I thought would be helpful, nice to have, and not needed based on initial thoughts and conversations I had during my in-person interviews.

With interviews under my belt and the survey gathering data I could comb through, I tried to combine my new findings into a persona to represent and be the user I would try to serve.
Developing my persona in a response to the information and experiences people shared with me, I set this as a my springboard:

Next, I set out to see what existing options people had to understand the pathways between points of interest.

These apps/services all could be used while cycling with Google and Strava offering cycling specific data. Google Maps is the only offering that provides vibration cues for the user.
I know from my own experience, that mounting a smartphone on your bike handles to both observe information and make changes seemed ideal. I also found the phone distracting, and vibrations aren’t detected because the terrain and physicality of cycling is more active than awaiting for a vibration from a smartphone. Would that be helpful to other riders? I was the only user to attach a smartphone to their bike out of the pool of people questioned in this study, so I couldn’t confirm that it’s presence would make a difference — so I eliminated that.
It was then that I recalled that bluetooth notifications already trickled outward from the smartphone to car speakers already, so why couldn’t users take advantage of this existing feature with on-ear devices they already own or are interested in acquiring?
This is just one example of an easy to integrate bluetooth accessory for bike helmets.

For my user flow map, I followed the process and considered what I thought would be the ideal journey for someone wanting to receive information about their ride towards a destination.
And what I found after creating this and setting out to take the first sketches into prototyping, was that I did not remain anchored to this 100%. Instead, as a first step I was more in favor of an organic production, that reacted to the insights and usage tweaks that would be learned from doing tests and designing features.



Wanting to decrease the drain on a cyclists senses, preserve split second reaction to any number of threatening situations if necessary — I decided that aiming for as little distraction as possible was the solution I could build out from. I sketched out what I imagined for a cyclist to receive updates from, and then I checked to see what bluetooth products existed on the market:

Then I followed up with a search online and found not only smart helmets in production, but accessories that can be affixed to existing bike helmets which meets the inexpensive target I wanted for consumers.



This was GREAT!! I sensed I was honing in on a direction that was actionable and reserved myself to trusting the ongoing process. Now, I needed to jump into the next phase, sketch and develop the user’s journey from my notes into drawings and build my first prototype.

Sketching out each screen was as rewarding as it was about revelations. It was a rising progression of additional screens needing to enter the group to capture empty states, first time use, loading times, and animating details to communicate transitions and interactions for the user.
Once I brought these screens into Marvel’s online prototyping software, still a few more were needed to flesh out the initial flow.
Next, using Marvel’s internal layout and creation tools I went from low-fidelity designs to mid so I could get closer to what I wanted to see, and begin user testing with friends and family.
I stood alongside my first wave of testers, explained that they were meant to pretend to “go home”, and at first things seemed to go well. People would touch, swipe and see what would happen. I would tell the story of themselves as the cyclist (which I realized would be an aid absent from the “real” experience) and this planted the idea to share a prototype with no introduction to my testers whatsoever. I would do this later on and it was invaluable move for my development.
I learned from prototype test wave 1 through lightly guided demos and observations, that the prototype needed to go much further to express my intent. But for a start it was a step in a good direction which led to presenting these findings for my mid term presentation.

Using Sketch to transition from lo-fidelity to high was a pleasure and a welcome challenge. Having familiarity with Adobe products like Illustrator, Photoshop and Indesign I was finally able to cut loose and jump head first into this new program. It wasn’t easy, but it was a worthwhile experience.
Thus, 6IXCYCLER was born from the pit of user data and surveys to lay waste to the mission before it…uncomfortable city/urban navigation hahaha.

Watching my screens come together and breathing “life” into it was really exciting. Invision is intuitive and user friendly.


Thanks to the incredible participation from User “M”, I gave no instruction whatsoever to see how my user flow, adjustments, and graphic treatments were interpreted.
These, and the other tester feedback I received was pivotal to the last stage of growth before I needed to present all my findings for the end of the course. Have a look at a sample user test below.
With more collected feedback from whatsapp, and even during my preparation for my final presentation, I would periodically open up sketch and make adjustments to my screens before uploading back into Invision.





I also realized that the perspective of the user should (obviously) reflect their point of view, and progress in the same direction of their movement (moving forward onscreen as a visual support).

Lastly, I was fortunate enough to learn from my previous presentation, and pushed myself to incorporate more of the feedback I received from the instructors. I recorded myself to see what I could learn…from what I learned!! Haha!!

Now that I find myself on the other side of this creative User Experience program, I feel like I’ve grown and absorbed new sets of skills, practices and methodologies I had hoped for.
Now, I plan to continue to hone these newfound skills by not only adding improvements to 6ixcycler, but to also identify more challenges people encounter with a new perspective. Work though them remaining as curious, unassuming, and hopeful as I can be.
With enough effort (and some creativity) I will continue to strive to become a better thinker, creative designer, problem solver and professional.






