RidEase

Ride with your neighbor at ease

Deliverable: Car-sharing Mobile App

Role: [Individual] User research, Design strategy, UI

Duration: August 2022 - December 2022

Course: SI 582 Interaction Design, University of Michigan

The Problem

Locally, it is very difficult to share a ride or get rideshare easily at an affordable price.

In Ann Arbor, there are over 14,583 people who do not own a car. At the same time, 54.2% of people drive alone. There are great opportunities for people to share a private ride in the same direction. So, people need a better way to: 

  1. Schedule/share a ride easily 

  2. Get a ride at a more affordable price by carpooling

  3. Build long-term relationships with drivers and riders by offering regular rides

Introducing RidEase for private car-share

RidEase is a non-profit platform that is targeting to help people get or share rides in the same direction. It is cost-effective, efficient, and community-building.  

How will this work for riders?

A rider can schedule rides in a few steps. He will select his destination, confirm the ride, and rate the driver. In addition to the places, he can see the driver ratings, time, and frequency of the visits. 

1. Browse places to go

2. Select a destination

3. Select the driver

4. Confirm the ride

5. Start the ride

6. Rate the driver

User Stories for Riders

How could RideEase help people get to places more easily?

Let’s see how people without a car are thinking when they need a ride.

How will this work for drivers?

A driver can publish his schedule and trips on RidEase. When a rider selects his car-share, he will get a notification about the rider and confirm the ride. When it’s time to pick up the rider, he leaves and started recording this trip. After the trip, he also gets to rate the rider for punctuality and cleanliness.

User Stories for Drivers

Why would people want to share rides?

Let’s see how car owners are thinking when they drive alone.

Anti-persona

What about people who may not be interested?

Let’s also include the voices of people who may not be users of this product.

Competitive Analysis

Why did I choose to design an app for private car sharing in the local neighborhood?

Let’s see how current ride-share products are working . . .

If you’ve tried to call an Uber or Lyft frequently, you may have been met with hefty prices and longer-than-usual wait times. Buses are great options when the bus stop is nearby, and ZipCar is also amazing when people are able to drive. But there’s no existing product for affordable, efficient, and community-building car share platforms in the market.

What differs RidEase?

  • RidEase is non-profitable — It only reimburses drivers a certain amount for gas and effort. All the trips are standard flat fees based on mileage.

  • RidEase is efficient — Scheduling and live tracking enable people to limit their wait time.

  • RidEase is sustainable — Sharing a ride with others can save on gas, vehicle maintenance, and parking costs and lessens traffic congestion and pollution.

  • RidEase is community-building — Regular rides with people nearby can provide an opportunity to meet new friends locally.

How will this impact the ride-sharing industry?

Below is a demonstration of how a driver could make use of RidEase to share rides regularly and make new friends in the neighborhood.

Create profile

  • Enter all car information, description, and driver’s license

  • Drivers need to add their own addresses to verify their localness and ensure safety

Review all trips

  • Trips include all past and upcoming trips

  • The upcoming trips include necessary details such as destination, status, category, and date.

Brainstorming at the beginning

Below are some sketches I explored during the brainstorming session for car-sharing methods. I find observing in daily life can inspire me to experience design better. Some non-digital experiences can even be cooperated into the product to maximize usability. For example, the post function is added to the driver’s publication in the square for riders to view.

Low-fidelity prototype

Brainstorming 8 ideas for car-pooling

Decomposed actions for car-pooling ideas

Few other design processes that I explored

Below are low-fidelity paper prototypes I established during the design process to test out usability. Here are a few things I improved in the updated interface design:

  1. Provide fewer destination options to increase the chance for drivers and riders to match

  2. Develop the rider’s view first, rather than designing two perspectives at the same time at the beginning

  3. Distinguish from commercial ride-share software

Closing Thoughts

Why this project?

This is my attempt to make more people travel more easily and share resources in one’s own way. This design reduces the complicated software for ride-sharing and I believe that the mode will close the gap between the high prices of existing car-share products.

Thanks for reading!

Note: This is just a preliminary product of how non-profitable car share platforms could work. And there are still a lot of details and business models to be considered more deeply. But I hope this project could inspire some people to take action and create a better environment for sharing.