AirPorter
Designing an IoT system for airports that empowers users to fly smarter, not harder
UX Research // IoT Design // Case Study
Role
UX Researcher
UX Designer
Timeline
Jan. - Apr. 2024
4 months
Skills
UX Research
IoT Design
UX Design
Storytelling
Team
5 UX Researchers & Designers
Tools
Figjam
Qualtrics
Photon Kit
Figma
Overview
As part of our Pervasive Interaction Design course (SI 612), we worked in groups to design an IoT solution that tackled an area with opportunities for improvement using ubiquitous computing. Our group decided to improve the airport experience, specifically the frustration and stress travelers experience while at the airport.
Our final solution is a network of beacons and accompanying mobile application that aims to:
Help travelers manage their time
Provide flexible in-airport navigation options
Consolidate the fragmented flying experience
As a UX Researcher and Designer, I worked with our team to conduct user research and draw insights that informed our final product. I also worked on designing both our beacon and mobile app prototypes, which we ultimately used to present in a final demo.
Why AirPorter?
Background
Airports are often a source of stress and anxiety for many travelers, and rightfully so. From long security lines to constant flight delays to lost baggage, people often have had negative experiences at airports. Ask anyone, and they’re probably ready with their most recent airport horror story.
Given how many opportunities for misstep there are from the moment a traveler enters the airport to when they get seated on their flight, our intuition was that airports would be a great area to improve with IoT solutions. However, we needed to first verify that there were problems people experience that could benefit from IoT designs
Image Credit: Norbert Braun on Unsplash
Contextual Inquiry
We began our research by conducting contextual inquiry with 5 participants who had recently traveled through an airport. Our goals were to identify key problems that were addressable with IoT solutions, as well as to understand which types of travelers we should target in future research. Our main insight was that:
Travel Needs May Vary, But Clear Information is Key
Frequent flyers prioritize getting timely information to manage potential delays. International travelers face language barriers that impact how they navigate the airport. Nervous travelers struggle with the unfamiliarity and over-stimulation of the airport environment.
Many factors could contribute to a traveler’s stress and anxiety levels, potentially leading them to miss an important announcement or not catch their flight. However, regardless of travel experience, clear and timely information is essential for a smooth travel experience.
Cultural Probe & Survey
While the results of the contextual inquiry provided a good starting point for us to brainstorm possible ideas, we needed to gain a clearer picture of our target audience and their specific needs. We conducted user research in the form of cultural probes and surveys to determine the differences and similarities among different types of travelers, identify their specific needs, and decide on the best audience for our solution to target.
Cultural Probe
Goal
Collect quantitative data from frequent flyers, international flyers, and inexperienced flyers that focuses on understanding travelers’ overall behaviors, emotions, and values regarding the airport
Logistics
14 participants received either a digital or physical cultural probe with various artifacts centered around airports. Sessions were primarily unmoderated, which allowed participants to interact with the cultural probe comfortably at their own pace
Survey
Goal
Collect quantitative data from frequent flyers, international flyers, and inexperienced flyers to understand travelers’ experiences and pain points in airports, supplementing the qualitative data from the cultural probe
Logistics
We received 120 responses to our Qualtrics survey. The survey was composed of mostly close-ended questions, for which we conducted quantitative analysis on the responses. There were also a few open-ended questions, for which we coded the responses to identify common themes.
Key Insights
92% of participants, regardless of travel frequency, experience stress at airports, especially from navigation difficulties and lack of real-time updates
We initially thought that different types of travelers experience different problems, so we’d have to narrow our audience to 1 specific type of traveler. However, our research showed that regardless of travel experience, most participants experience stress at the airport due to navigation difficulties and lack of real-time updates. This informed our decision to broaden our target audience to include all airport travelers.
Security procedures, flight delays/cancellations, and navigation within the airport are the biggest challenges participants face
Participants face many challenges in an airport, and often times, if participants are traveling in a group, they cope with the stress of these challenges by shifting responsibilities onto others. This supports the possibility for our solution to lessen the impact of these challenges by acting as a travel-buddy for travelers, helping them navigate, manage their time, and stay up-to-date on announcements.
Travelers juggle multiple apps and websites to aid their time in the airport, leading to a disjointed experience
Travelers have a collection of apps and products they use while in an airport, each with a different purpose. This fragmented system of information overwhelms travelers and increases the likelihood of overlooking an important piece of information, so there’s opportunity for our solution to create a more streamlined, cohesive user experience for travelers.
Beginnings of AirPorter
Target Audience
Our research led us to focus on tech-savvy travelers who would benefit from precise and timely flight updates, schedule reminders, and airport navigation assistance. These include travelers who fly infrequently and are unfamiliar with airports, travelers who are running late and need immediate and accurate information, and travelers who feel comfort in planning ahead
Possible Solutions
We decided that our IoT solution would focus on real-time updates, time-management, and navigation assistance since these areas can be significantly improved through the implementation of an IoT system. The following ideas were considered based on feedback from our research:
Collect and display accurate information about the wait times for check-in, TSA, and immigration, along with flight updates using beacons, GPS, and/or BLE technologies.
Provide suggestions/notifications for time management based on estimated wait times at various stages, as well as the overall travel time between different parts of the airport
Accelerate navigation and travel within the airport for anxious and late travelers using robots and/or self-driving vehicles within the airport
Design Constraints
We also considered the following design constraints when ideating and prototyping different IoT solutions:
Infrastructure Compatibility
The technologies we choose to use in our IoT system should be compatible with existing airport infrastructure. It also has to work within the bounds of the federal regulations and processes for airports.
Cohesive User Experience
Our solution should create a unified user experience that provides users with all the information they need in 1 place, eliminating the need for them to juggle multiple apps and products.
Scalability
Our solution should be scalable to accommodate future growth, along with implementation across different airports.
Offline Functionality
Considering potential situations where Wi-Fi access may be unreliable, our solution should still provide access to basic information even without any connectivity.
Data & Privacy
Our solution needs to ensure the security of the users’ travel information.
Testing AirPorter
Storyboarding
We created various storyboards to map out how different solutions might help users in different scenarios
User Enactments
We developed a Speed Dating Matrix as we were ideating different solutions to test their viability. Specifically, we were interested in users’ comfort with different levels of automation. Some solutions included smart robots, driverless cars, and beacons and NFC integrations with users’ existing devices. Using the Speed Dating Matrix, we categorized key scenarios based on different interaction and intensity levels, and scripted user enactments to test our concepts with potential users.
Key Insights
Wanting Control over Decisions
Users prefer having information and assistance in executing their decisions rather than having decisions automatically made for them. If possible, users prefer having information the day before they’re supposed to be at the airport so that they can plan ahead and prepare themselves.
Willing to Pay for Convenience
Users value features that offer them a sense of privilege and control within the airport, even if these features come at an additional cost, because they perceive their flight to be more important. When users do pay for a feature, payment should only be processed after the service has been provided so that users are certain that they got what they paid for, preventing financial loss and confusion.
Managing Expectations
It’s important to manage expectations by informing users that the IoT system cannot change airport operations (e.g. flight delays, security lines). When not enough data is available to provide accurate information and estimates, users should be notified so that they can plan accordingly.
Considering Airport Congestion
While smart robots are an exciting solution to explore, they’d likely make the already congested airport environment even worse. Instead, our IoT solution should prioritize not contributing to the crowded and overwhelming airport experience for both users and the surrounding travelers.
Introducing AirPorter
Product Video
Key Features
Stay Up to Date, All in One Place
Users receive real-time visual and audio notifications about flight statuses, gate changes, security wait times, and more.
This ensures travelers are always equipped with the information needed to make informed decisions, creating a smooth and cohesive travel experience.
Navigate with Ease
Users can access the intuitive navigation system on their phone.
The system uses the user’s GPS to pinpoint their location within the airport, helping them navigate to terminals, gates, amenities, and services with ease.
Manage Your Time
By connecting to the system of beacons and the airport’s Wi-Fi network, users have access to personalized recommendations and alerts.
Recommendations and alerts are based on the user’s location, helping them stay on schedule and efficiently navigate through the airport.
Skip the Lines, Save Time
Users can expedite their journey through the airport with Fast Pass and Smart Car integrations.
In situations where time is of the essence, users can pay for Fast Pass to quickly go through security checkpoints, avoiding the lines.
Smart Cars are available to transport users directly to their gates after the security checkpoints. With connectivity to the gate agents, Smart Cars can alert staff about the users’ status and imminent arrival.
Challenges & Learnings
Test Early and Often
While our group identified many potential areas for improvement within airports, we weren’t confident of the direction we should take until we conducted more research and testing. After we narrowed down on a problem, we also weren’t sure of what elements our IoT should be made of. We needed to test multiple solutions to figure out which solutions best addressed user needs, as well as which types of technologies existed within users’ comfort zones.
Lo-Fi Prototypes Are Your Best Friend
Since the product we were developing was an entire IoT system, it involved a lot of moving components interacting with each other. Verbally explaining our ideas was too confusing and creating hi-fidelity prototypes would be too time consuming; lo-fidelity prototypes were our most useful tool. Lo-fidelity prototypes provided just enough context to make it easy to visualize how different ideas might be implemented while not being too time-consuming to create.