CicLAvia Travel Map
Academic Project | Service Design | Product Design
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Tools
Bicycle, PVC Pipe, Figma, Photoshop, Google Slides
Client
CicLAvia
Timeline
Sept. - Dec. 2022
Team
Christina Strok, Alba Chavez, Sam Heinreich
My Role
Researcher, Concept Development, Product Designer, Project Manager
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News Article
Challenge
Through the lens of Neighborhood Engagement, CicLAvia tasked us to identify, create, and design ways to get community members excited about the event and see it as an opportunity to activate their spaces.
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Problem
When planning a CicLAvia event, organizers will go door-to-door notifying communities of the event details. However many businesses considered it a closure instead of an opportunity to attract customers to their stores.
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Solution
We designed a traveling map to increase community engagement at the event. This large-scale, physical traveling map gives participants a visual understanding of their location while the traveling guide informs them of activities happening in real time and ways they could participate at the next event.
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How might we get participants excited about the event along the route while encouraging business participation?
Meeting Stakeholders & Industry Experts
Leading up to our concept development we spoke to two industry experts and a CicLAvia stakeholder. Through these conversations we found that whatever solution we develop it is important to keep the participants needs at the center.
Rachel Burke
CicLAvia Chief Program Officer
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"CicLAvia's goal is to transform the way people engage with their communities and each other."
Aerienne Russell
CicLAvia Product Manager, Outreach & Engagement
"Show… the owners that you care… a phone call or an email, and social media for cross promoting."
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Jeanmarie Hance
Urban Collaborations Group, Community Outreach Program Manager
"To drive participation... define where they should go... art... food... what really speaks to the feel of the community."
Gathering research out on the field
After meeting with industry experts we were able to shadow the CicLAvia outreach team as they traveled Downtown LA posting flyers to let the community know of the event and the road closures. Surprisingly we found that this method was not very impactful, the flyers were very small, kept falling and the outreach team was not very engaging. Click below to see our observation synthesis.
Surveying locals
To better understand the needs of CicLAvia participants we got an opportunity to survey and engage with them at the Heart of LA CicLAvia event held on October 9, 2022. The survey specifically asked participants what they wanted to explore about their community and their satisfaction levels of the event. We also asked participants to share with us what their favorite place along the route had been.
What our survey revealed
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Participants at the CicLAvia event in October needed access to a map to help them navigate the route, find open businesses and find their friends.
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The map created an opportunity to have conversations with event goers and help them explore new places they would have otherwise not known of within their city.
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Local business owners need an easier way to get information on how to get involved.
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Exploring Possibilities
To address our user and stakeholder needs we explored several solutions, a media kit for businesses, having a community booth, and creating a travel map with guide. Based on stakeholder feedback they liked the travel map concept the best.
Media Kit
Digital media kit with 30 sec ads that encourages local businesses to participate
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Community Booth
Designated booth to provide participants with resources to local artists, restaurants and photo opportunities
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Travel Map
Display CicLAvia route details, nearby restaurants and in real time route events
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Designing the Travel Map
We started with sketching out the prototype. We wanted to figure out the dimensions of the map plus the hitch, and what materials were needed to build our idea. We discussed how to stabilize and attach the map to the hitch and then formatted the map to fit and be ready for print.
Building the Travel Map
We used PVC pipes and zip ties as well as our own bikes and bike hitches assemble the travel map. CicLAvia provided us with the board of the printed map and list of booths and events happening along the route which we added to our map.
Travel Map Launch
We debuted our travel map at the South LA CicLAvia on December 4, 2022 and it was a hit! As we rode down the route our map got people’s attention. Our hats and shirts made us an obvious source of information and many people felt comfortable approaching us to ask questions and get directions.
Results
During the event we conversed with various participants and they all loved the travel map.
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Christian
Owner of The Boyz Barbershop
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We met Christian along the route, he approached us and asked us about ways his business could get involved at the next CicLAvia.
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Mike & David
CicLAvia Participants
Mike and David are regular riders who love attending CicLAvia’s and biking events around the globe. They asked us how long the route was.
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Kendra & Tami
CicLAvia Participants
Kendra & Tami got to see their location on the map and how far they still had to go. They loved our map and wished to see it at all CicLAvia events.
Improvements
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We noticed some participants wanted to have a deeper understanding of their location, specifically how far they are from the next hub or where they were along the route.
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More iconography on the map and use of megaphone would have helped give us guides some pointers but also to start conversations.
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We interacted with many families along the route and shared the hubs that had activities for children but we felt we needed something to hand out, like a paper where kids could color in or a list of kids activities.
Future Considerations
Donation on wheels
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Donation Box: Add a donation box in the back of the bicycle for participants to donate
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Interchangeable Signs: Use interchangeable signs to showcase CicLAvia ads/marketing
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Sponsorships: Work together with sponsors to display their signs as well
Sponsor Highlights & Events
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Promote events: One side of the map displays the route and the other side showcases specific events on the route
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Monetization: Sponsors can pay for space on the map and guides can send participants to their locations
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Highlights: Showcase specific events CicLAvia wants to highlight for more engagement
Mobile Announcements
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Supply guides/volunteers with megaphones to announce events along the route
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Announce food areas, bike repair areas, bathrooms, rest stops, etc
What I learned
Getting to work directly with the CicLAvia organization was an amazing experience. They were receptive and communicative throughout the whole process.
I'm especially proud of my team for working collaboratively to accomplish this project that we hand built ourselves.
If given more time I’d like to test our travel map at the next CicLAvia event but this time with the improvements we identified. I'd also like to explore how this travel map and guide can further help the organization with other issues such as donations, marketing and etc.
