Every week I'm amazed all over again at the increase in bike usage in
Seoul Korea. My normal movements are in a very hilly area of the city
where traffic is concentrated in the valleys and most cyclists opt for
the flat bike paths lining the rivers and streams. I've been blown away
by the numbers using these segregated bike paths but had assumed the
cyclists were mainly on these paths since few can be seen in the hilly
areas. I was wrong. Over the weekend I road through a flat part of the
city for the first time perhaps this year. Bikes were everywhere. It
was fantastic to see.

It's hard to account for the growth in bike use by looking at advocacy
efforts, MUP construction, gas prices, etc. I think the only way to
account for it is to understand that it's now a fad here. Not only is
rding socially acceptable, it's become the thing to do. That's a major
cultural shift.