Parq: Parking App

Project Overview

• Timeline: October-December 2025 (7 weeks)

• Course: SI407: Advanced Design

• My Role: UX Designer & Researcher

• Team: Angel Nguyen, Marcela Passos. Sineen Raslan, Avery Schiff

• Tools used: Figma, FigJam

Slideshow Presentation | Figma File

Parq is a 7-week team project focused on designing a native mobile app that helps drivers quickly find, compare, and pay for parking in crowded urban areas. The app is designed for college students, commuters, and city drivers who frequently struggle with unclear parking rules, limited availability, and unpredictable pricing.

The Goal

Our goal for Parq was to create a simple, intuitive parking app that helps users quickly find, compare, and pay for parking with confidence. We aimed to reduce the frustration caused by unclear rules, inconsistent pricing, and limited real-time information by designing an experience that is transparent, easy to navigate, and tailored to the needs of students, commuters, and city drivers.

Why Is This Project Unique?

Parq is unique because it focuses on simplifying parking specifically for campus and city environments— contexts where rules are confusing, availability changes quickly, and existing tools often fall short. Following comparative analysis, we aimed to have Parq prioritize real-time clarity, easy comparison, and intuitive navigation designed around student and commuter needs. 

Our team approached the problem with a clean-slate mindset, integrating insights from user research and competitive gaps to build a solution that reduces stress, boosts confidence, and fits seamlessly into users’ daily routines.

Problem Overview

• Difficulty finding available parking near destinations

• Confusing parking signage and restrictions

• No centralized way to compare cost, distance, and availability

• Wasted time and fuel spent circling for spots

• Stress and uncertainty, especially during busy hours or events

Competitive Analysis 

We found that...

• Competitors emphasize real-time clarity

• Most apps showcased parking proximity and price

• Many interfaces focus on transparency and trust such as having verified data and navigation integration

• Competitor UIs are often cluttered, highlighting an opportunity for simplicity

Product Vision Board

Early Exploration and Sketching

Usability Testing & Demo

From 5 usability tests, we noticed...

• Users had trouble identifying available parking due to unclear labels and visual clutter, leading us to clarify the Street/Lot toggle and simplify layouts

• The app felt visually denase, so we updated text sizing and overall readability to reduce cognitive load

• Users expected clearer availability cues and more standard UI elements, prompting the switch to native iOS datetime pickers

• Payment and extension flows were mostly intuitive, and we refined component organization to create a smoother, more consistent experience

Prototype Link: Click here to test it out!

Developer Handoff Summary

Design Tokens: Ensured standardized color, type, spacing, and component tokens applied across map, payment, and session flows

• Annotations: Provided ample annotations for dev handoff to ensure interaction, content, and accessibility information is clear

• User Stories: Ensured epic covered stories where users can find available parking on a map, start a session by selecting time, add/select a payment method, and extend an active session

System Overview:IOS components, SF Pro typeface, consistent bottom-nav structure, reusable components (cards, modals, pickers), and clear error/fallback handling

Reflection

While working on this project, we learned a lot about our peers and their needs. And, although this app is designed with all urban spaces in mind, our team was especially excited to work on something that could directly impact our own community.  Throughout the project, we also gained insight into how small design decisions like clearer navigation, real-time updates, or simpler comparison tools can significantly reduce everyday stress for users.

Everyone in the Ann Arbor area knows how difficult parking can be, and designing a solution for a problem we experience daily made the process feel meaningful and personal.

Impact

While we have no hard data on how this project would aid users, our design would allow users to:

• Quickly find parking spots near them and save favorite spots for quick access.

• Compare the cost, location, personal needs availability, and general information of multiple spots.

• Options to integrate with users' existing navigation apps.

• Pay, extend time, and end early to ensure accurate parking availabilty data.

Overall, collaborating on a product rooted in real, shared frustrations helped us stay grounded in empathy and reinforced the value of human-centered design in creating practical, community-focused solutions.

Next Steps

In future iterations of Parq, we hope to...

• Conduct another round of usability testing to validate improvements

• Build out additional edge-case flows (no availability, invalid payment, location error) to ensure the app handles all real-world scenarios smoothly.

• Begin designing Phase 2 features such as reward integrations, parking history insights, and enhanced navigation guidance to support long-term user engagement.