Seoul - Higher gas prices are driving more South Koreans to leave their cars at home and commute by subway, local transportation authorities said Thursday.

Seoul Metro said it was carrying at least 16,000 more people a day compared with one year ago.

"The increase may have something to do with the gasoline price increase," said an official at the state-run corporation.

In the city of 10 million people, the subway, one of the most heavily used systems in the world, carries an average of 4 million people a day on more than 8 million trips on the system's nine lines.

The average cost of a subway ride is 1 to 1.40 US dollars per ride.

"In recent weeks, we are gliding through some downtown places at an hour when we used to be stuck in traffic," said Lim Seung-Chull, a taxi driver in Seoul.

Seoul's government said that in recent weeks, it had been collecting fewer tolls from solo drivers who are charged 2 US dollars each time they pass through a tunnel in rush hour to drive into downtown Seoul.

"We are losing at least 100,000 US dollar a day," said a collector at the Mountain Namsan toll gate.

Meanwhile, bicycle riders have increased, as have online sales of bicycles, according to an operator of the online shopping mall www.auction.com.

"This month, we were selling 25 per cent more bicycles from one year earlier," a manager said.

In Seoul, the price of gasoline is 1.79 US dollars per litre, compared with 1.54 US dollars in Japan and 2.22 US dollars in Germany, according to an online survey by the Joongang Newspaper.

It had been about 1.40 US dollars one year ago in Seoul. (dpa)