How digital guidance helps to improve mobility experience: An interview from Turku
Exceptional traffic circumstances increase the need for digital guidance. Tanja Ylänen, graduate from the Service Design degree programme at the Turku University of Applied Sciences, is sharing her insights into this topic based on her thesis “Guiding people in exceptional traffic situations – Service design for the digital mobility map of the City of Turku”.
Have you ever been out on the town and come across a construction site or a public event that abruptly cuts you off? Unusual situations that influence mobility are part of everyday life in cities, but they can also make it difficult or even impossible to get around. Digitalisation opens new opportunities for wayfinding. Public operators have a key role to play, as they have access to information that commercial service providers may not have. For example, Google's map app will not tell you if the Turku riverbank is temporarily closed to cycling because of a street market.
My thesis examined, by means of service design, what information people need about exceptional traffic situations and how these situations could be reflected in a digital map service. The commissioner of the thesis was the City of Turku, and the service to be developed was Turku Service Map and its mobility view. The research focused on the following forms of mobility: walking, cycling, car, and mobility aids. The goal was to help people travel in the city smoothly and sustainably during events and other exceptional traffic situations.
“What are your key findings?”
Exceptional traffic situations affected everyone moving in the city. The most faced situation was a worksite, and the most frequent effect was the unexpected interruption of the route.
Author Tanja Ylänen
Works as a Development Manager in a financial services company.
Graduated Master of Business Administration, Service Design 2022
Early work experience includes an internship at the European Parliament in Luxembourg in 1997.
Bikes to work when the weather permits, is considering getting an electric bike.
Lives by a small lake. Loves cross-country skiing, which is challenging to practice in south-west Finland because of the winters with little snow.
Factors promoting smooth mobility in exceptional traffic situations were predictability and accessibility for all modes of mobility. Advance information was especially important for people with mobility impairments.
When moving in familiar places, people did not usually seek information about their route in advance, unless they knew there was something out of the ordinary on the route. On the other hand, wheelchair users tended to plan their route carefully, but could not easily obtain sufficiently comprehensive and detailed information on the accessibility of their destination. Also, people with pushchairs were more likely to consider their route in advance.
Information about exceptional traffic situations was often provided from the organization's perspective, but users needed information about the impact on their own mobility and how to get to their destination in the most convenient way.
Advance information does not replace well-organized alternative routes and on-site guidance. Physical and digital wayfinding should work seamlessly together as part of the wayfinding ecosystem.
“How do you think mobility guidance should be done digitally?”
Route along a construction site in Turku, Finland (Copyright: Joel Karlsson)
Ideally, the digital service would help to anticipate or avoid delays or interruptions to travel. The information should be easy to find and accessible to all users.
This research sought to understand how the service fits into people's patterns of behaviour and how it could best serve them. Therefore, it was important to find out what happens before they take off. The choice of mode of transport was an essential part of this process. The main factor influencing the choice of mode of transport was convenience. Environmental friendliness, cost and getting exercise came next.
“How would you suggest tackling the issue that people do not research familiar routes? i.e. the route disruptions always come as a surprise?”
It is worth considering whether the information should be provided proactively. The possibility to subscribe to alerts on exceptional traffic situations, for example based on location, would contribute to the findability of the information. At least the information should be extremely easy to find in the service.
Some people were wary of the idea of using yet another new digital service, saying that ideally, they would receive information on a platform they use anyway. If the information was in a separate service, it should offer other added value. For these users, added value can be created by providing information that competitors do not have. This could include real-time information on local events and their impact on mobility, and offering context-based mobility recommendations, for example during large construction sites and events, that highlight sustainable ways of traveling as the easiest option. When encouraging people to use sustainable modes of transport, it is useful to put convenience first.
“What is the key information people, whose routes have been disrupted, want?”
In general, people thought that it would be useful to get information about exceptional traffic situations in advance in one way or another. Information should be available as easily as possible, and it should be in a clear and easy-to-read format
People expected the information in the service to be real-time or at least very frequently updated. According to a third, the appropriate place for information would be a real-time map. Also, some form of intelligent guiding was envisioned.
Information was needed about situations that are typically faced unexpectedly, such as demonstrations. The more unexpected the situation, the more important the signage on site.
Signposting for an event in Turku (Copyright: Joel Karlsson)
Ideally, the service would provide information on all situations affecting mobility, including small and short-term ones, and provide independent and up-to-date information from the user's perspective. People with mobility impairments called for sufficiently comprehensive and detailed information about the impact of exceptional traffic situations on route accessibility. The most important advance information was information about diversion routes and their accessibility, also the time and duration of the situation were important to know. Car user would like information on recommended alternative forms of mobility during the situation.
“What should be researched further?”
Several topics for additional research emerged from this study. Considering the city's climate goals, promoting sustainable mobility with the help of mobility map could be a fruitful topic for research.
. Turku is a popular travel destination and Service Map's mobility view could also serve visitors; hence their needs could be mapped more comprehensively.
Furthermore, those who drive in the city as a profession could be studied further as a user group. One of the interviewees was a delivery truck driver, who had some special needs compared to others.
The starting point for service development should be people, not technology. The best way to succeed in today's environment, including the public sector, is to know your customers better than your competitors and use this knowledge to the benefit of both your customers and your organisation. Design thinking and user-centred methods can help to achieve this.
Users look for the same level of experience from local services as from global brands, across industry boundaries, thus Turku Service Map should strive for a world-class customer experience. All interviewees had experience with Google Maps. However, it provides limited information on exceptional traffic situations in Turku and the region.
Finally, advance information is no substitute for clear temporary signposting and well-organised diversion routes.
The article above is written by the master’s thesis author Tanja Ylänen as part of the Scale-up project activities on mobility guidance in connection with events and exceptional circumstances and implementing a real time regional mobility data platform.
The thesis (in English) can be found here: Guiding people in exceptional traffic situations : service design for the digital mobility map of the City of Turku - Theseus
The Scale-up project has received funding from the European Union’s horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No. 955332