Atlas:
Mobility-as-a-Service
We sponsored a team of graduate students from the Department of Human-Centered Design and Engineering at the University of Washington for a capstone project in which they developed a speculative design for a Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) application. MaaS is an on-demand service that integrates and unifies several different forms of transportation services -- such as bus, light rail, rideshare, bikeshare, rental scooters -- into one solution. The project’s final deliverables include a front-end user experience and the identification of systems architecture and interfaces necessary to make this experience possible. The team developed the design for the specific case of mobility in the Seattle metro area.
The U.S. transportation infrastructure, policies and culture all bias us toward personal automobile transportation for most trips, with negative consequences for the environment and for health. Alternative forms of transportation are more beneficial to health because they involve more physical activity and, often, more social interaction and exposure to the outdoors. The challenge of shifting more trips to active transportation modes is largely dependent on the availability of reliable, high-quality services and infrastructure, but it also involves two other factors that affect consumer choice: user experience and pricing models. MaaS offers the opportunity to provide a unified experience for users and creative solutions to pricing that could be competitive with the total cost of automobile ownership.
Work Products
Atlas Prototype
The team developed an animated visual prototype of the different functions of Atlas, their speculative design of a Mobility-as-a-Service app.
Process Book
The team documented the process for developing the design in this report. It includes project background; research findings; ideation and definition work; design and testing; and reflections on lessons learned.
Team Interview
Ryan Alli, Nora Carr, Max Edelmann and Rajiv Pennathur sit down with Steve Downs to reflect on the project.
Final Deliverable
This report includes visual design guidelines; along with storyboards and user flows for the different transportation scenarios.
Mobility-as-a-Service for Seattle
The team’s initial report on their user research findings, along with a summary of the overall project concept.