In line with the recent LA wildfires, my team and I were given the prompt of exploring how the emergency evacuation process can be made easier or less panic-inducing for two diverse stakeholders: individual community members and city management at large. My UI/UX solution responds to the needs of community members, so this will be the primary focus for this case study.
The majority of natural disaster support apps today don't offer localized information or a sense of community beyond the initial effort for prevention and detection. This creates a gap between the period of disaster and individuals' time to process and seek greater support. Most importantly, when power goes out, many solutions are completely unusuable without technology.
An app to help meet the needs of the community before, during, and after disaster evacuations by personalizing and localizing the evacuation planning process and building a network effect of support communities connecting those evacuating with those who've already done so in the past.
ResQ was designed with the goal of prioritizing the essential needs of users without getting distracted by excessive features and other UI elements. From ideation to the interactive mockup, the interface is as simple and easy to understand as possible.
User Journey Flow
DESIGN DECISIONS
Optimizing for no-tech scenarios with easy access to PDF evacuation plans for download
Based on user feedback and research on the various contingencies of full tech solutions for disaster evacuations on apps, I made the personalized evacuation have a PDF download option so that wifi and power outages wouldn't be a safety barrier.
PITCHING THE CONCEPT
Final sprint — pitching ResQ to USC IYA grad students and alumni with my team
My team and I presented our extensive user research, problem space findings, ResQ app solution, and a no-tech education city education hub strategy to USC professors, students, and alumni and received valuable feedback on the value and potential of ResQ moving forward.
NEXT STEPS
Expanding the MVP for real-case user feedback and building social media support communities
Having completed the initial interactive prototype of this app and gained real user interest from the ideal customer personas, ResQ's next steps lie in developing an MVP app and building a social media community to connect those in this problem space to feed into the app and create a network effect.