pathVu Navigation

pathVu & SWPPA
Pittsburgh, PA

Executive Summary

pathVu is a Pittsburgh-based startup, whose mission is to create a more accessible world for all pedestrians of any ability. SWPPA (Southwestern Pennsylvania Partnership for Aging) is a 31-year-old, volunteer-led organization representing more than one million older adults across Southwestern Pennsylvania. We are working with both of them to help achieve their mutual goal of a more accessible pedestrian experience.

Problem: Sidewalks and pedestrian walkways vary in condition and therefore in accessibility, creating challenges for older adults and people with disabilities who cannot comfortably and/or safely travel on them. Furthermore, information about the accessibility of the “Last Mile”—the part of the journey that is near and at the destination—is desired but difficult and burdensome to obtain.

Solution: pathVu’s current mobile app provides users with optimized routes based on sidewalk and path condition data that they obtain through their own collection methods and users’ participation in crowdsourcing. Our team is currently working to not only increase the usability of their app, but also add in features that address the metaphorical Last Mile and motivate more people to collect accessibility information through incentives and a feeling of community.

Challenge

Our clients’ initial goals were to improve the usability of the re-routing feature and increase the number of active crowdsourcing participants who collect accessibility data. When we came into the project, we took a step back. Our challenge was to explore the problem space of accessible pedestrian navigation, determine fruitful research questions, and design a valuable service that could be deployed in the short-term and developed over the long-term.

Role: Project Manager, Lead Researcher

As research lead, I created and managed the execution of our research plan. I decided the research methods used and helped determine the direction of design based on insights.
As project manager, I am responsible for managing tasks both on short- and long-term scales, ensuring decisions are considered and communicated well, and ensuring the team is progressing through the necessary stages of the project.

Team Members

> Amanda Crawford
> Aditi Dhabalia
> Andrew Kyroudis
> Meo Zhang

Methods

Data Collection
 > User Interviews
 > Contextual
    Inquiries
 > "Card Mapping"
    (card sorting +
   journey map)
Data Analysis‍
 > Affinity
    Diagram
 > Survey Analysis
Ideation
 > Storyboarding
 > Parallel
    Prototyping
Testing
 > Usability Test
 > Think-Aloud
 > Diary Study

Process

Thuy-Vy Nguyen and a teammate at a whiteboard moving sticky notes around

QUESTION: How do people with disabilities currently navigate?

Contextual Inquiry + User Interviews

Before we could speculate about a possible future state, we needed to understand the current state. To do so, we conducted seven contextual inquiries and four semi-structured interviews with older adults and people with mobility and visual impairments. During the interviews, we simply walked along with them or, to accommodate COVID-19 restrictions, had them record a walk and then watched the video together.
Photos of the team conducting in-person and remote contextual inquiries
Findings
When people with mobility impairments travel as pedestrians, efficiency is still important; comfort is just one consideration when deciding which route to take.
Pedestrians with disabilities use technology as support or backup, not a primary resource.
Quotes
"If this was the quickest route, and I was really late for a meeting, I’d still probably take this [bumpier] surface."
- wheelchair user
“The GPS is support for my mental map.”
- older adult with vision impairments

INSIGHT: Having to follow re-routing directions in an app while traveling is a barrier to efficient, short, phone-less travel.

Journey Map

We then created a journey map to consolidate and visualize how older adults and people with disabilities travel as pedestrians.
A journey map of how people with disabilities travel as pedestrians with a red box around the last part of the journey showing more negative feelings
A journey map that shows significantly more negative feelings in the last part of the trip.
Findings
The final part of the journey—the “Last Mile”— is a huge pain point.
Quotes
“My wheelchair with me in it weighs close to 600 pounds ... I have been carried up steps, which I don’t like.”
- wheelchair user
“It’s embarrassing to ask where the door is.”
- older adult with vision impairments
“I’ll do a dry run before I go somewhere new [to find parking, bus stops, and see how easy it is to get in].”
- older adult

INSIGHT: Providing accessibility information about the “Last Mile” has the potential to add significant value.

What is the Last Mile?

In the scope of our project, we are defining the Last Mile as the last part of the journey, where the traveler is close to the destination but needs to get to the entrance and into the destination itself.
A diagram showing the Last Mile as the last part of the journey, where pedestrians may encounter obstacles such as cobblestone or construction, as well as need features like accessible parking or an automatic door
While the Last Mile was a major pain point for many of the people we spoke to, we realized people with different impairments have very different accessibility needs in this part of the journey.
A diagram showing the differences in challenges people with mobility impairments and people with vision impairments face in the Last Mile
People with vision impairments tended to have more challenges with orientation and location.
People with mobility impairments tended to have more challenges with obstacles and terrain.
Findings
It is unlikely we could design a better navigation tool than a white cane or guide dog for people with vision impairments.
People with mobility impairments lack a centralized source of accessibility information.
The needs of people with mobility impairments are more in line with pathVu's existing target audience and database.

Because people with mobility impairments have unmet needs in the Last Mile that correspond with our client's existing database of accessibility information, we decided to narrow our target user group to them.

QUESTION: How can we get more accessibility data?

The Last Mile is so named because not only is it the last leg of the journey, but also because it presents a “Last Mile” problem for us. In logistics, the term “last mile” is used when the last 10% of a process is harder and more resource intensive than the first 90%. In the context of our problem space, this 10% of the journey is the most difficult for our users and the most difficult for us because it requires significantly more people reporting data than the first 90% of the journey does.
The “Last Mile” Problem
A diagram showing how more people are needed to report data at specific locations than on a route
The width of the arrow represents the number of people—and therefore the number of potential data collectors—in a given place.
On a sidewalk, there are many people traveling who can collect data, but only a few of those people will go to a particular destination. As a result, fewer people are available to collect data about a specific point of interest, but that information is what is most needed.

INSIGHT: We need to engage as many people as possible—including able-bodied people, who do not personally need the information—to collect accessibility data.

"Pretotype" Testing

To investigate how we might motivate people to participate in active data collection of accessibility information, we mocked up a super low-fi “AR” game, where players would find and report sidewalk cracks and collect digital monsters that reside there.
Our low-fi "AR" game screens and participants playing it
Findings
Able-bodied people aren’t sure what or how to report accessibility information.
Able-bodied people need some continued value out of the task to be engaged long-term.
Quotes
“It's difficult to evaluate how difficult it is to pass, because I have no problem passing, but I can't speak for others.”
“I want to help, but... probably wouldn't feel motivated to continue playing after the novelty wears off.”

QUESTION: How can we motivate able-bodied people to download the app and collect accessibility information?

Storyboards

We knew we needed to provide able-bodied people with some value in order to get them to download the app and input data. To investigate how we could make the app valuable for able-bodied people, we put together some storyboards to see if our participants would download an app and report information in the situations we presented.
4-panel storyboards showing situations where a person may want to download an app and input information
Findings
Able-bodied people are motivated by money; helping increase accessibility is an added benefit.
Able-bodied people don’t question tasks that feel familiar.
Able-bodied people don’t want to feel forced into doing anything.

We used these findings to come up with a data collection roadmap for our clients.

Phase I
Community Events
Phase II
reCAPTCHA-style
Phase III
pathVu app
Icon with graphics of a person in a wheelchair, a person with a walker, and a person standing walkingreCAPTCHA logopathVu logo
Volunteer organizations and advocates go out for a day and actively collect a large amount of accessibility information in their neighborhoods.
Customers of pathVu-partnered local businesses, who are waiting in line or shopping on their websites, tag pictures of routes and buildings with the accessibility features they contain through a reCAPTCHA-style mechanism.
The pathVu app is fully developed out and has evolved into a community app where people collect data in order to improve their neighborhood and to get discounts at local businesses.
We now had a data collection plan, but what data are people collecting? We know people with mobility impairments need to know the accessibility of routes and destinations, but we still weren’t sure what exactly constitutes that information.

QUESTION: What exact information do people with mobility impairments need as pedestrians, and when do they want it?

"Card Mapping"

We did an activity-based interview with 10 participants with mobility impairments that combined card sorting and journey mapping to determine exactly what accessibility features and obstacles they wanted to know about when traveling as pedestrians and when during the trip they wanted to have access to it.
Set of cards with accessibility features and obstacles
We had participants do three activities with this set of cards that include accessibility features and obstacles. We gave them the option to create their own cards if they felt something was important that we did not have a card for.
Activity 1
Categorize the cards however they felt appropriate
Activity 2
Assign votes to the cards based on the features and obstacles they most want to have information about
Activity 3
Fill in the journey map (below) with actions they currently do while traveling and, using the cards, information they would ideally have
Empty journey map showing three columns representing phases of a journey and two rows representing participants' current actions and information they would ideally have
The journey map template participants filled in using the cards and text description

FINDING: By using the number of votes as points, we created a quantitatively defined list of the accessibility features and obstacles that are most important for users to have information about.

FINDING: People with mobility impairments want to know the most information during the pre-planning phase.

Solution

Once we learned what information people with mobility impairments want, when they want it, and how we can gather it, we got to work making and testing prototypes that would combine everything into one usable and enjoyable app. This app will provide older adults and people with mobility impairments accessibility information about their routes and destinations, as well as allow anyone to crowdsource that information in exchange for rewards at local businesses and the knowledge that they are helping their community.
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