Citymapper Challenge
Citymapper is a public transport and mapping service. It was launched back in 2011 in London. They spent over a decade on building a technology to show users options on how to get from one pinpoint to another.
Empathize & Define
While interviewing people who are using public transportation frequently or almost daily, the issue regarding the ticketing system keeps coming up. So the purpose of doing this case study is simply to solve the problem of having to purchase tickets from different public transport providers.
I interviewed 4 people (age: 24–59). All of them are living in Berlin or in the outskirts of Berlin. All of them travelled to other big cities around the globe and faced similar issues.
Some questions I asked:
- What types of public transportation are you using to move around?
- Which service are you using to see where to go and how to get there?
- What do you like most about the service and what are the pain points?
- How is the ticketing process?
The conclusions I got so far:
The interviewees are all using Google Maps, none of them even knew about the Citymapper app. 2 of them are students and have a monthly ticket. In Berlin it is pretty simple when it comes to the ticket system. We have 2 main providers, DB and BVG. You can buy a ticket with either one of them and it is good to go for the whole city.
You can purchase a ticket via Paypal, Apple Pay or Credit Card. But if you don’t have any of those payment methods, you need to use a vending machine. This is time consuming and mostly confusing especially while being abroad.
The ticketing process is especially a pain point for people who don’t have the common payment methods, it doesn’t matter if in their own country or somewhere else around the world.
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So the question is: how can we improve the issues people are facing when purchasing tickets for public transportation by creating a new ticketing feature for Citymapper.
Ideate
After brainstorming about different systems to make it easier for users to purchase tickets via one app and not having to use different apps or services to go on a simple trip in a major city, I decided to go for a Citymapper Pass. But you can still link your Citymapper account to Apple Pay, Google Pay, Credit/Debit Card and Paypal.
You would be able to link your bank account to the pass. There would be different types of passes:
- Day Pass
- 3-Day Pass
- 7-Day Pass
- 14-Day Pass
- 30-Day Pass
Prototype
Conclusion
The pain point is very clear. Purchasing tickets online when you don’t have a credit card or any other common payment method is impossible. The only other way is going to a vending machine and buying a ticket there.
It was definitely helpful to hear other people’s opinion about that, since I use my credit card or Apple Pay for everything. It is always the easiest way. But if I think about older people who basically just have their bank account, they most of the time cannot use any online ticketing system.
I liked this challenge, my first design thinking one. To think out of the box and not take it for granted just because it is working for myself.
