MTA Future State Digital Experience
Category
Branding, Digital, Product, Strategy, UX, WebAbout This Project
The Setup
The MTA was looking for a design partner to build and keep improving a high-quality digital experience for its customers, following industry best practices. It came to Sparks Grove to define a minimum viable product: a new responsive website and iOS and Android apps, all ADA compliant. Beyond the MVP, the MTA wanted a future-state vision and a way to measure progress, to show its commitment to a best-in-class digital experience that keeps evolving.
What I Led
At Sparks Grove, I led the design groundwork. I defined the MVP: real-time arrivals, service status, trip planning across subway and bus, and accessible routes with elevator status, all on the web and in the apps. I shaped the future-state vision around a mobile-first experience that carries one journey across phone, web and touch screens in the stations. The design draws on the black band, white rule and colored route bullets of the subway signs, plus the stripes from the map cover. Alongside the vision, I set the measurement plan: task success, time to answer, trip confidence, accessibility compliance, adoption, and handoffs from the station screens to riders’ phones.
What We Delivered
- MVP definition for the responsive website and iOS and Android apps
- Future-state vision: location-aware “Near you,” trip planning, a live trip companion, disruption rerouting, OMNY fare capping and reduced fare
- In-station touch screens with a live map that hands the trip off to your phone
- A design system built on the subway signs, the route colors and the map cover’s stripes
- ADA-first accessibility, including step-free routing, live elevator status, audio guidance and multiple languages
- A measurement plan to prove the experience is improving over time
To be clear about where the work ended up: Work & Co ultimately built the app. This page documents the foundational design phase, not the shipped product.
