Reimagining the parking meter to eliminate cognitive friction and provide a seamless, stress-free payment experience

SmartPark

Role: Product Designer
Tools: Adobe Illustrator, Figma, Google Forms,  Miro
Disclaimer: This project was created purely to demonstrate my skills and knowledge in the field, without any connection to a real company or product.
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What is SmartPark ↓

SmartPark is a parking meter that reinvents the way you pay for parking by using an intuitive touch screen and an easy-to-follow process driven by basic UX principles, user feedback, and user testing.

Background ↓

How it started

For as long as I've lived on Long Island, a tiny fish-shaped island just east of New York City, I can't recall one pleasant experience at a parking meter. Can anyone? Parking meters have always been the bane of my existence, and I'm sure many others would say the same. The problem stemmed from the design-flawed user interface and overall structure.

Problem ↓

Locals don't have an easy way to pay for parking because the existing parking meter is difficult to use and time-consuming.

Individuals spent time grappling with the process of operating the haphazardly designed parking meter.

Paying with coins

1. Enter space number > 2. Press green button > 3. Insert coins > 4. Input duration > 5. Take receipt

Paying with card

1. Enter space number > 2. Press green button > 3. Insert card > 4. Input duration > 5. Take receipt

Goal ↓

Allow locals to easily pay for parking, shortening the amount of time it typically takes and streamlining the process.

The Town of Islip community needs a solution that incorporates a user-friendly interface that makes paying for parking seamless.

Research ↓

20 local residents were surveyed.

Here's what I found.

The steps on how to pay for parking are confusing and time-consuming.
When it’s time to pay, users don’t know where to look on the meter to continue.
Entering the amount of time to park is the most difficult step to users.
The parking meter is not useful to non-English speakers.
Most users think an entirely new machine with a touchscreen would be easier to use.
The screen is difficult to see.

3 themes recurred.

Users are unsure how to use the existing parking meter.

Solution: Reduce cognitive load
The existing parking meter is haphazardly designed.
Solution: Grouping related elements to give meaning
The existing parking meter can't be used by everyone.
Solution: Implement accessibility-focused features

Testing ↓

How usable is it?

By conducting moderated usability studies, I assessed how easy or difficult it was for users to complete the core task, which was to pay for parking. The overall user experience appeared to be sufficient enough to move forward without any massive changes. All the users completed the core task with ease.
By watching users think through tasks, I uncovered pain points that drove new improvements.

Users spent a long time calculating how long they needed to be parked.

Time-on-task: 45s average
The new design lacked helpful elements that could impact users’ desired parking time, such as the current time and rates.

A

B

C

C

Improvements:

A Current time

B Dynamic display
of expiry time

C Financial elements
(rates & cost)

Users lacked awareness around specific details.

User error rate: 100%
100% of users were unable to input the max parking time available with $2.25, because the design lacked helpful elements that could impact users’ desired parking time, such as the current time and rates.

Improvements:

Types of accepted credit, which is always displayed during any transaction, weren’t shown when the user would pay.

A Accepted credit cards

Details, such as the parking spot #, weren’t present on-screen, so the user would never know if they were incorrect. Also, there was no option to revise these details.

B Parking spot #
C Edit option

A

B

C

Final ↓