Station displays

Background

Transport for London (TfL) is a government body responsible for the transport system in Greater London.

The services TfL operate include London Underground, London Buses, Docklands Light Railway, London Overground, TfL Rail, London Trams, London River Services, London Dial-a-Ride, Victoria Coach Station, Santander Cycles and the Emirates Air Line.

Objective

The key objective was to redesign station displays so that customers could read and understand service information, allowing them to make vital decisions quickly. The system needed to be capable of handling the pressures of multiple issues affecting the network in a useful, simple and intelligent manner.

Approach

I led a team of designers (UX, visual and researchers) to run a series of design cycles over the course of six months. These cycles were split into short, defined sprints that delivered a user-centered solution sensitive to the needs of the business and technical constraints.

Research & analyse

I reviewed existing research, explored design theory and conducted customer and staff interviews, to better understand information needs.

Design & test

The team and I created a prototype using live data that we trialled with customers and staff in four underground stations, spending a week in each location capturing feedback.

Develop & iterate

I developed a design system and service application based on learnings from the trial.

Exploring the landscape

The first step of the project was to get a better understanding of the problems faced by customers in the station environment; exploring how these impact mindset, cognitive load and the end-to-end travel experience

Existing research

I spent several weeks sourcing research to ensure we were clear on existing insight and to avoid duplication of work.

Field research

My understanding of user needs at this stage was a little light, so I decided it was important to get some first-hand experience.

The team and I visited 3 different stations and conducted customer and staff interviews. We asked questions about travel habits, information needs and screen usage.

We also ran observation activities to better understand behaviour in the station environment.

RTI landscape

I reviewed all the TfL touch points and third party apps to see how they were implementing real time information.

Stakeholder engagement

There are many departments, people and systems involved in delivering real time information. I ran workshops and interviews with key stakeholders to understand their needs and objectives.

Mapping workshop

I ran a mapping workshop with the project team to better understand the landscape and complex environment. Identifying how and when digital service screens fit into the end-to-end experience.

British road signs

I researched similar design systems, such as the ambitious British Road Sign project, launched in 1965. Both experiences had a lot in common in that users needed to be able to make quick decisions about direction of travel whilst moving. Their effective system used shapes for different types of identification signs with legible type and bold pictograms.

Setting the direction

Research analysis

There was a huge amount of new and existing research. To help with analysis, I decided to create a project war room to gain clarity and to effectively guide stakeholders through my thought process.

I visualised key insight, considered how it affected the current experience, and how I could potentially prioritise short and long-term objectives.

Definition

During the discovery phase I identified huge issues with the location of some displays. In older listed stations some screens were completely hidden or obscured by architectural features. However, due to budget and planning restrictions, the decision was made to backlog the issue.

The short-term objective was to focus only on content redesign and deliver a system that could support key user needs identified from the research:

Creating the concept

Sketching

Firstly, I focused on sketching concepts that I thought may solve the identified issues. I spent quite some time in this phase; iterating, developing and testing different routes.

Prototyping

Once the team had internally agreed a direction, I started to see how this would look and function on a real station display. I created some assets and acquired a unit to test on.

Design development

The team and I developed the design to handle different scenarios and created an HTML prototype to test with RTI data.

Trials

After developing the prototype, I decided the best way to validate our approach would be to trial with customers and staff in a live station environment.

The team and I visited four stations and conducted a week of research in each to understand the environment and trial the design.

Trial activities

The solution

On completion of the trials, the prototype was updated to include key insight. After multiple cycles of iteration and testing, the team felt in a good position to move into full delivery and initiate roll out across the network.

I worked closely with the development team, assisting with front-end code, to deliver a new design system with the following improvements:

The outcome

The live date is fast approaching, so watch this space. As the solution is rolled out, TfL will be monitoring the station environment to understand the impact of the new design system.

From a business perspective, TfL senior management were very pleased with the proposed solution and the approach to delivering information in the station environment.

My role

In my role as Design Lead, I was responsible for all aspects of the design process detailed above. I also played a major role in facilitating collaboration and engagement with the key stakeholders throughout the process.