Spain is not even in the same league as the Netherlands when it comes to cycling. We're improving, though, especially here in Seville, and it is the cycling infrastructure that has brought it about. In only five years Seville moved from 0.4% mode share to 7%, about the same as Portland. We've recently been out counting cyclists and we believe the numbers are now even higher, somewhere between 8% and 10%.
It sounds as though you and I have a lot in common. I lived in Southern California (in San Diego and for a couple of years in Glendale) in the the 70's, too, and commuted by bike. I agree, it's disheartening that more people don't cycle in that part of the world and in this one. We advocates need to keep on cycling, of course, but I'm convinced that pushing for more and better bike lanes, bike sharing programs and improvements to mass transit will get more people out of their cars faster than simply setting an example by cycling ourselves will.
Regarding how difficult it is to convince voters to support building the kind of cycling infrastructure that is needed, I'm not as pessimistic as you are. In Southern California it will probably have to be done little by little, one bike lane at a time at first, but then, when people see how advantageous these lanes are to communities and how inexpensive they are to build (our entire system of physically-separated bike lanes cost less than the one underground line that has been built here and moves many times more people), the idea will catch on. Rising oil prices and the coming oil shocks that many of us believe are inevitable will further motivate people to get behind changing the current car-centric system, which is expensive, wasteful, dangerous, harmful to the environment and unsustainable.
Here's an interesting article about Seville's remarkable transformation:
http://www.bikesbelong.org/news/staf...ransformation/