Municipal Parking App
Modernizing the parking experience for a large Canadian city: from a 2.4-star liability to a 4.7-star daily utility.
Role
Led product, municipal parking
Industry
CivicTech / Transport
Client
Local Government
Context
Civic & GovTech
01. Product Overview
Faster Urban Parking
The app is the city's official parking app, letting drivers find spots and manage payments with real-time zone detection and parking account integration. It is used by tens of thousands of drivers as an everyday utility, which sets a consumer-grade bar for a government product.
02. What I Led
A Fast-to-Park Mandate
I drove the roadmap and the user research with one mandate: systematically remove every step between opening the app and starting a paid session.
A research-led UX overhaul took the app's store rating from 2.4 to 4.7 and cut support tickets by 40%. We also shipped a way to pay for someone else's parking, which made it a ten-second job for families and groups.
A research-led UX overhaul took the app's store rating from 2.4 to 4.7 and cut support tickets by 40%. We also shipped a way to pay for someone else's parking, which made it a ten-second job for families and groups.
03. The COVID Chapter
The App as a Response Channel
When COVID emptied downtown, the app became part of the crisis response. A local-business feature shipped in about two weeks, putting 20+ downtown businesses back in front of the drivers the app still reached.
The bigger response was a new flexible parking pass, taken from idea to on sale in under 30 days, that generated $6M. It gets its own case study.
The bigger response was a new flexible parking pass, taken from idea to on sale in under 30 days, that generated $6M. It gets its own case study.
04.
Outcome
Mobile payment adoption climbed, the store rating held above 4.5, and the app became a daily utility for the city's drivers: evidence that a government product can meet a consumer-grade bar when the team treats residents as customers.
Key Insights & Takeaways
- Public-utility apps must work in low-signal, high-stress conditions. Field testing finds what lab studies miss.
- The fastest adoption wins came from removing steps.
Let's Connect
Looking for a similar outcome?
Let's discuss how we can modernize your product operations or accelerate your AI roadmap.