Amsterdam hasn't been big on cycling for a "very long time". It was a very car heavy city for a while and is now on a better track thanks to changes in policy.
As a Dutch person, it was great reading this, because I always assumed that the Netherlands had cycling ingrained in its culture. This would of course make the cycling success of Dutch cities hard to replicate elsewhere. To see that activism and political will played a large role in creating the current cycling climate makes me hopeful it can be replicated elsewhere!
https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2015/may/05/amsterdam-bic...