Quote Originally Posted by thegrump View Post
I will add one more thing, which is the basis of my trustworthiness. A few years back, I used to ride my pushbike to work and back. The trip home was a distance of 42km, so I was not dawdling. One day while tearing along a bike path along side the Merri Creek in Coburg, what did I see coming my way. Father and son taking up the head, 4 females coming up the rear covered head to foot. As I approached the son stepped aside to let me through. The father grabbed him and placed him back beside him. Now I had a split second choice, run the kid over, which would had dislodged me from the bike and well have been beaten to death before I was conscious, or leave the track and be impaled by a tree. I choose the second. I did come a cropper in the bush, but un impaled. When I got to my feet and looked at where I had come from, there was Father, son and the 4 females, walking off as if nothing had happened. I could have been badly injured or worse, did they care, NO. In fact I think they wanted me hurt. This act told me, the Father was telling his son "he is not one of us, so he does not matter". Now you are going to say, but that was just one. OK, so next time, do I trust them to step aside for me. NO. It will not happen.
My sympathies. You probably did not read the rules for such paths before using them, and perhaps you still haven't. A cyclist is always required to give way to pedestrians on shared paths and the fact that you were going too fast to stop would indicate a degree of reckless driving on your part. On checking the bicycle rules, it would seem that you are actually not allowed to ride on these shared paths as an adult unless you are supervising children. I hadn't realised that one either, but then I never travelled at a speed that would put walkers in risk of their lives.