Developing personas to improve understanding of users’ needs in digital mobility: An experience of the DIGNITY project in the Barcelona Metropolitan Area

This paper contributes to the understanding of the end users’ needs and capabilities in digital mobility by presenting a set of personas developed using data from a population-representative survey conducted among 601 Barcelona Metropolitan Area (BMA) residents. The questionnaires were carried out within the framework of the DIGNITY project. The results show that large parts of the population cannot access digital technologies or lack the skills required to use them effectively. As a result, they are not able to take advantage of many digital mobility solutions. The personas in this paper thus present important information on the diversity of potential users, in a way that designers and other stakeholders can find inspiring. This can help them to create inclusive mobility ecosystem, that fit the users’ needs better, resulting in more people being able to use the solutions.This research was done as part of the DIGNITY project, which received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme under the Grant Agreement number 875542 and was also partially funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities, project RTI2018-095518-B-C22 (MCIU/AEI/FEDER).Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft