DIWY — The parking solution
“We don’t identify a problem as a problem until we face it ourself or become a prime witness of an incident”
In any product company, product release party is a time for celebration for everyone involved. The same thing was happening in my company — VYOM (a subsidiary of Rivigo). We had launched our apps on Google Play store and had planned our release party at Sector 29, Gurgaon on a Friday night. A friend of mine couldn’t find a parking spot for his car due to a heavy rush of vehicles and after a couple of hours of hunting, he parked his vehicle outside the parking lot.
When he returned to his car around 2 AM, he found it’s window broken and his laptop bag missing from the back seat of his car.
He had to go to the police station in the middle of the night and file an FIR about his missing bag. And the succeeding 3 weeks were hell for him with multiple visits to the police station, until his bag was found.
Blaming the wrong thing
Based on human behaviour, we can conclude that:
He should not have parked his car outside the parking lot.
He should not have taken his car to a crowded place.
Right?
These statements can be termed as Learned helplessness (as mentioned in the widely revered book — The Design of Everyday Things by Don Norman) The phenomenon might help explain the self-blame. It refers to the situation in which people tend to blame their own misfortunes on the environment. It seems equally natural to blame other people’s misfortunes on their personalities.
Research on a mass level
As of March 03, 2015, there are 7 states that have more than 10,000,000 registered motor vehicles viz. Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat, Karnataka, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh and the total number of registered motor vehicles in India being 210,023,289.
Vehicle theft reports
- In Pune, Mumbai, Thane, and Nasik, around 20,000 cases of vehicle thefts are registered every year.
- In a Hindustan Times article, Delhi Police reported that 4 vehicles are stolen every hour and motor vehicle thefts for the year of 2017 was found to be 39,080.
- In Karnataka, vehicle theft is one of the top crimes due to which Banglore government has launched an App where a user can file a complaint and download a ‘vehicle not traceable’ report which helps them speed up their insurance claims settlement.
Recommendation and problems identified based on user interviews
- Confirmation of parking space beforehand
- In case of insufficient parking space — park vehicle near a safe place
- Underground or Multi-storey parking lots
- Automated parking
- Reviews of parking lots available online
- Roadside parking be banned to avoid traffic
- Usually roadside parking happens because the nearest parking lots are far from the market
The scope of the solution
- Real-time updates on parking availability
- Pre-booking facility
- Secure parking
- Rating and user feedback
- Change in roadside parking behaviour
Proposed solution
The book “BOLD” by Peter H. Diamandis & Steven Kotler talks about the 6Ds for exponential growth and my design solution revolves around 3 of the 6Ds, which are-
Disruption - Any innovation that creates a new market and disrupts an existing one.
- Right now we park our vehicles in parking lots which are usually paid, permitted and supervised. Or else we park on roadsides ie. in-front of someone’s house or shop without permission. This solution will disrupt the existing parking system. On one hand, it will enable users to keep their locality traffic free and on the other hand, it will help visitors get confirmed parking spots near their place of visit i.e market, hospital, mall etc.
Dematerialization- It is about the vanishing of goods and services themselves.
- Solution doesn’t require goods and services like automated multi-storey or underground parking lots, instead it only requires a full-fledged server and application where communication regarding parking availability can happen.
Democratization- It happens when those hard costs drop so low they become available and affordable to just about everyone.
- The proposed design solution is for everyone and by everyone. Anyone can post the availability of a parking space (private/public) online on his digital device at any point in time. Therefore, the problem of parking for all of us can be solved by all of us.
Challenges
- Security concerns in case of private parking
- Society parking is restricted to visitors
- Parking package division might restrict users to extend the parking time
- Parking lot provider should be verified in order to avoid mischievous activity
Design
UX Laws — Principles
- Jacob’s law — Considering Jacob’s law of UX design which says “users spend most of their time on other sites. This means that users prefer your site to work the same way as all the other sites they already know.” Keeping that in mind the user interface is inspired by cab services applications.
- Hick’s Law — I have divided the time slots into 5 packages based on the major events performed by users. It will help in minimising the decision making time by eliminating the equation of calculation of how much time user should book parking space.
Usability
Upfront options to Add parking and Book parking.
Color
Turquoise is a color that balances blue, green and yellow, but it also can be linked to emotional balance. Looking at this color gives a feeling of serenity and stability.
Real life mimicry
Time slot selection is based on real-life events performed by the user when they are outside and require parking viz. Office, Movie, shopping etc.
Discoverability & Signifiers
As Don Norman explained in the book “The Design of Everyday Things” that overall display of the device is itself discoverable, therefore designer should add ‘Signifiers’ on the display to initiate any action. Hence I have marked Signifiers with Turquoise or Dark grey tone so that user can easily identify them.
In conclusion
The proposed solution is simple, cost-effective and can provide a better result in a shorter span of time. It can solve the parking problem on major scale especially in metro cities and help in reducing the traffic problem that occurs due to roadside parking.
