Transforming journey planning

In the UK, people are travelling more often by rail than ever before. Stress levels can run high on those journeys. From finding the right platform to delays and purchasing tickets, there are so many pain points passengers must navigate just to get from A to B.

Working with one of the UK’s largest transport operators, Go-Ahead Group, we have turned journey planning on its head with On Track to create the fastest, smartest journey planning experience available for anyone travelling by rail, on any line, across the UK.

On Track meets all your travel requirements in your pocket, intelligently polling data from Go-Ahead, National Rail Enquiries and Transport for London.

Available free for both iOS and Android phones, On Track comes branded for each of Go-Ahead Group’s rail companies: Southern, Southeastern, London Midland and Thameslink.

Right from the outset, it was immediately apparent that most journey planning apps consistently failed to reflect passengers’ personal daily travel habits and requirements. The experience was often generic and impersonal.

To top it off, the application of web technology in the mobile environment meant existing experiences were sluggish, leading to poor performance that hampered usage and transactions.

We took a different approach and made it our mission to understand passenger pain points, stripping away any unnecessary steps. To help us, we recruited hundreds of passengers from existing networks to iterate designs, putting prototypes in their hands and capturing their feedback across every stage of development.

At the heart of the app is an intuitive dashboard that can be easily personalized. It is designed to surface real-time information immediately upon opening. The dashboard presents train times, platform information and live service updates for regularly travelled journeys without the user needing to ask.

The user can see exactly where their chosen train is at any point along its journey. The route is shown on an interactive map, with stops and interchanges of each individual journey leg clearly marked.

With an easily accessible secondary menu, contacting customer services, submitting a Delay Repay claim and even paying for car parking at Go-Ahead Group stations is only a tap away.