Seoul Bike 2 - Electric Boogaloo
I don’t know how you ended up in this corner of the internet, but I would like to thank you for visiting my blog.
What is Seoul bike? (but shortly…) #
Here is a brief overview for all the new readers who are not familiar with “Seoul bike”. The Seoul city government created a shared bicycle system as a first/last-mile means of transport and leisure for a shockingly low price, and the service exploded in popularity in the last two years.
This is what a typical “Ddareunggi” bicycle looks like. A name is definitely not easy to pronounce if you do not know Korean.
This is a child-friendly smaller bicycle, and I have seen families ride around the city with Ddareunggi bikes.
Short background #
When the system launched, the service offered a bugs-riddled app, inconveniences due to poor user experience design, to name a few. So as a side project, and went on to redesign the service and publish a free Sketch UI kit. You can read the case study in this blog post that I published in 2017.
Upgrades to the bikes #
Since 2017 Seoul city overhauled the whole system, from the app to the bicycles themselves, but these changes did not happen overnight, of course. Instead, the evolution of bikes happened with the introduction of a 4th generation that removes the touch screen interface and rack-locking mechanism to a considerably simpler lock and, I presume, a Bluetooth connection. “Does this mean you can park the bicycle anywhere?” you might ask. Instead, the service installs these roadside units (RSU), a term that is very well known in the automotive industry and V2X communications. Every rack has an RSU device that communicates with the bikes when they are within range, which prevents people from parking anywhere except in certain areas. Moreover, to unlock the bike, a user now needs only an app and enough arm strength to open a new plastic bottle of Coca Cola… …which is the sponsor of this post… (chillhop music starts playing in the background)
This locking mechanism is also the device that communicates with your phone and the roadside unit near the bike rack. When a user scans the QR code through the app, it sends a request that authenticates the interaction and tells the bike to unlock itself. To return a bike, a user has to park a bike on or near a ddareunggi rack and lock it.
| Old bicycle rack | New bicycle rack |
|---|---|
 |  |
Old racks still have the locking chain left from the old system, while the new racks are just a parking space for the bicycles.
| Communication unit for the old racks | Communication unit for the new racks |
|---|---|
 |  |
Roadside units, shown above, are the devices that communicate with the bicycles, and they make sure users are parking their bikes in the correct allocated areas/racks.
New app #
The app itself is significantly better than the previous mess, but this does not mean it’s good. A problem I notice with government-funded applications (not only this one) is that their quality is considerably lower, and maintenance is noticeably lacking behind compared to private service, which makes sense. But, again, I am not the one to blame capitalism for it. The service’s budget appears to be very low, and such services are very reliant on who is behind the wheel of the local government. The app’s overall design is slightly improved with a whole new home screen that makes sense (home screen customization is possible because not all people need the map as their entry point for this app).
| Main screen (Korean) | Main screen (English) |
|---|---|
 |  |
| App menu (Korean) | App menu (English) |
|---|---|
 |  |
The service now partially supports English, Japanese and Chinese languages which is a significant step forward for inclusivity.
| Ticket screen | Payment screen |
|---|---|
 |  |
The broken payment system is gone and replaced with more accessible options like KakaoPay, Payco and the government-backed Zero Pay.
| User information screen | Favourite rack menu |
|---|---|
 |  |
The user information screen and options could use a redesign and a good restructuring due to visual language differences and overall poor UX design. Nonetheless, the app is greatly improved.
Changes to the service #
A considerable amount of young users pretty much forced the service to upgrade their bikes and implement live tracking because bicycles were technically stolen by forcing a thin object (like a card) in the locking mechanism. I can’t say for sure, but I feel the average user will never even notice the transition, for which the operators deserve a pat on the back. Of course, if they increased the service price, many people would have noticed the change, but the prices stay the same, it’s a little bit easier for the user to interact with the service and everybody is happy (i presume).
Suggestions for improvement #
I think that the service is significantly better and there is no need to fix something that is not broken. Of course, the app and technical aspects are buggy and deserve a good stability overhaul, but the update from 2017 is better.
Predictions #
The bikes are very popular and people like them, the city treats the service as a first/last-mile mode of transport in competition with the electric kick-boards (which are a real pest on the street…), and all sides are happy! I have a feeling the city will slowly expand the fleet of bicycles and maintain them for the foreseeable future. I love the service and personally use them several times a month to travel back home from work, a short 17km ride I usually take in an hour ( slight boast 😉 ).
Elecle is one of the few shared bicycle services left in the city. Elecle are electric bicycles so that you can ride them without a scooter, thus comparing them with Ddareunggi is slightly unfair, but they are still bicycles.