Since the start of the pandemic in March this year, Baltimore City, Maryland, has been facing a recycling issue. They officially suspended recycling on August 31 due to many problems such as shortages of workers and more people working from home, thus collecting more trash than recycle. The city’s solution was to set up recycling drop-off locations within the city’s 14 districts. They created many issues, such as inflexible set hours for drop-off, and many residents are unaware of where a recycling center is located. Households began to dump their extra recyclable items into the trash as their collection keep pilling up.
I want to create a solution to assist Baltimore City residents with recycling during the pandemic.
Research Findings
Why is recycling suspended?
- Focusing on trash routes due to the pandemic
- Citing shortages of workers.
Their solution
- Set up recycling drop-off locations within the city’s 14 districts
- Inflexible set hours. At the beginning of the suspension, the hours were from 7:00 am-3:00 pm weekdays only.
Main issues
- Extra recycles goes into trash due to collecting piles.
- Contractors’ trucks and equipment cause issues
- Residents are unaware a recycling center is close to them.
20% increase of recycling due to more people worked from home and staying at home due to COVID
Survey Key Takeaways
With 14 users surveyed, questions asked such as how are you notified of the city suspending recycling? How are you informed about a date and time change? The handling of this problem and its most significant issues. These keywords below are what Baltimore City residents have been saying.
Interview Trends
4 interviewees living in Baltimore City
- This problem started to rise in March
- DPW has been reactive more than proactive until September
- No guarantee the next nearest dumpster will not be full upon arrival
- Clueless where the centers are located
“I used and viewed Facebook Baltimore city community for updates from others who are also as confused as I am and hear their complaints.”
- Last-minute notifications on dates/hours
- The city is starting to issue a citation for having large piles of recycling in the backyard
- Neighborhood people provide stable communication with each other
- People do not know nor hear from DPW (Department of Public Works) on updates
“Is there a limit to how much recycling you can put out?”
Overall, many residents have complained about how terrible the city has handled this problem. Many were not informed when dates and times have changed at a location. There was no clue about where and how to find a recycling center nearest to them. Many had to communicate through social media, neighbors, family, and friends to receive the right information.
Persona- Meet Natalie
“We haven’t been informed of anything beyond coming across articles on the news. I think many residents are unaware of the changes and have no idea where to drop their piles of recycling off.”
Competitive Analysis
Cities such as Boston, Nashville, and Atlanta face recycling suspension as well during the pandemic. However, their recycling suspension faces minimal issues. I looked into the City of Hoboken, NJ, City of Memphis, and Baltimore City’s 311 services to update and notify their recycling pickup residents. I also involved the Waste Management website’s general information about recycling.
Comparative Analysis
Waze (GPS navigation app)
- Creates directions ahead of time
- Ability to share out the directions
- Community-based; only ones involved in collecting observations always.
- Clear identified icons of various reports such as police, traffic, construction, accidents
Nextdoor (neighborhood social networking app)
- Constant connection with neighbors in the neighborhoods and nearby neighborhoods
- Provide a neighborhood map
- Archive recommendation section to browse and find information over time
Citizen (location-based safety alert app)
- See incidents and crimes ‘live.’
- Fast and accurate reports from the community
- Provide guidelines and restrictions when commenting and reporting an incident to the public
Reverse Brainstorm
Reverse brainstorming is reversing the problem to focus on the cause will help identify solutions more quickly.
I collected ideas from research from the website, Facebook Baltimore City community page, and Citizen app. Ideas were also from surveys, interviews, and talking to people.
Solutions- guided 3 design principles
Each category demonstrates outcomes to help assist Baltimore City residents with their recycling problem.
Real-Time Updates
- Map out 14 district’s drop-off locations
- Status of the recycling center’s capacity
- Highlight updates/alerts/ reminders
- Dates/Times/Holiday Hours
- Weather report
Social Community
- Anonymously to the public
- React by # of hearts
- Flagging will be made available.
- Live updates from local news
Education
- What is recyclable & what is not?
- Simple rules for recycling
- Facts & myths
- Digital newsletter signs up.
Sketches and Wireframes
Guided by site map and user flow chart, sketches drawn from the homepage, universal UI designs, and pages with annotations. The key to designing low-fidelity is determining where elements and features will be without getting sidetracked by colors, copy, and images. Detailed designs such as blog post copy, photos, and colors were included in high-fidelity wireframes—I adjustments the wireframes 3x before testing.
Responsive desktop prototype
User Testings
“I’m confused about how the average calculated while updating the dumpster status. I don’t feel my status was taken into consideration.”
7 testers went through critical scenarios evaluation of the end-to-end flow. Questions such as what would you predict would happen when you click on this element? Please describe your thoughts and feelings. I made final adjustments to present to the stakeholders.
Next Phases
Currently, Bmore Recycles is a responsive temporary solution for a temporary Baltimore City problem during the pandemic. The most challenging part of overcoming is interviewing perspectives living in Baltimore City. Even though the interviewees shared their concerns, there was not enough data to resolve the problem. Luckily, there was a lot of evidence and notes gathered from the Facebook community city residents and newspaper research to collect enough data to come up with solutions.
For the next steps, I would like to:
- Broader the use of Bmore Recycles to other cities.
- Expand to cities in different states
- Create a native mobile app with new additional features
- Validate accessibility
- Work with the city councils to continue updating new features.
- Present this to cities in hopes to create an MVP phase 1
