timeline
Oct 2024 - Jun 2025
ROLE
UX Designer
Team
1 Project Manager
2 Designers
2 Tech Leads
8 Developers
Disciplines
Interaction Design
Prototyping
UX Research
introduction
Land Conservancy of San Luis Obispo County
The Land Conservancy of San Luis Obispo County (LCSLO) is dedicated to caring for the diverse wildlands and critical habitats of the Central Coast through conservation, restoration, and stewardship, all while connecting people to the land and one another. They manage various properties including Nipomo, where this project will be implemented.
The LCSLO needs a new solution to provide educational audio tours at their Nipomo property. Their previous system using the "Visit" app is now obsolete, leaving visitors without access to the audio content. The property currently has interpretive signage, but LCSLO wants to enhance visitor experience through QR-based audio narration that triggers and plays an audio file when visitors scan a QR code at a POI. The user goes around the property (Kathleen’s Canyon Overlook) scanning the QR at each POI and listening to the corresponding audio.
research
Getting to know our users
Building on our research findings, each team member explored various screen concepts tailored to an audio mobile tour app. Much of our inspiration came from existing museums, hiking, and fitness tracking applications.
Through this exploration, we identified a core set of essential features to incorporate into the app:
A tracking feature to log completed visits
A settings option to change language preferences
A screen displaying a full list of available tour areas for easy browsing
A caption section that appears during audio playback
A navigation tool to help guide users to the designated QR point
Pivoting our strategy
When we first began, we had a crucial misunderstanding. We didn't realize this was a Progressive Web App (PWA) rather than a native mobile application. This discovery changed everything about our approach.
The actual constraints:
We learned that users couldn't freely browse through all audio files from a centralized list. Instead, they had to physically visit each location and scan a QR code, which would open content in a new browser tab.
There was no location tracking or GPS functionality as we had initially assumed.
This new understanding forced us to completely rethink our approach. Our original app-like features wouldn't work in this context. We had to step back and develop solutions that would function within a PWA environment.
designing
Wireframing
What worked well
100% of users successfully located key features
Users appreciated the nature-inspired visual design
All users identified their progress tracking
What didn't work so well..
Users tried using audio skip buttons to access other locations (not understanding they needed to physically move)
Only 50% correctly understood the checkmark system
"Tour Progress" terminology caused confusion—users thought it implied sequential order or GPS tracking
Design System & Component Library
solution
reflection