The failure of enforcement sends a signal to anyone on two wheels: the footpath is yours. Pedestrians be damned.
Walk down any footpath and it’s highly likely you’ll have an unrequested encounter: the whoosh of a bike passing within centimetres of your shoulder, or the sudden buzz of a motorised scooter or e-bike bearing down from behind. For many — parents with prams, people with disabilities — the footpath no longer feels safe. How did we get to this point, and why does it appear nothing’s being done?
Before we get to the law around bikes, let’s do a refresh on why footpaths were first constructed. The origin of the modern footpath goes back to Paris around 1780. The French called them trottoirs — from the verb ‘to trot’ — a name that speaks directly to the problem they were designed to solve. So, what was that problem?
Paris streets were unpaved and a free for all: pedestrians, traders, livestock, and horse-drawn carriages competing for the same muddy track. Horses were fast and indifferent to anyone on foot. Injuries and deaths were common. To sort this problem, Parisians raised stone kerbs separating pedestrians from the road — a simple idea the world gradually adopted through the 1800s. These trottoirs was created to protect people on foot from fast moving things. So, it’s ironic that more than two hundred years later we have the same problem — with bicycles and e-bikes rather than horses.
The law on this is clear. Legally, cyclists aged 12 and over are generally required to ride on the road or in a designated bike lane. If accompanied by an adult, children under 12 can ride on footpaths. It’s totally illegal for petrol-powered bikes, scooters, and most e-bikes to ‘hog’ these pedestrian owned spaces.
Numerous forces have converged to create the chaos that pedestrians face. The explosion of food delivery apps (Uber Eats, DoorDash, etc) is just one, but it’s a significant problem. Under pressure to deliver orders, many riders choose footpaths over roads. Their logic seems to be that the risk of being hit by a car is more likely than the risk of a fine or abuse from a pedestrian. As if they care about the latter.
Where are the police here? The law isn’t ambiguous. NSW Police have authority to fine cyclists riding on footpaths. Yet enforcement seems rare.
Perhaps this is the police view: resources are limited and priorities lay elsewhere. But when riders see that there’s no consequence for footpath cycling, many will simply intrude. I’ve come within centimetres of being knocked over — no warning bell, no apology. Just the unexpected rush of something passing where it had no right to be. It’s frightening.
While the rules are clear on paper, it’s a different story on the footpaths, at least in my experience in Sydney.
The incident that stays with me involved my granddaughter, who was two years old at the time. We were in the mall at Bondi Junction — a pedestrian space, where families shop and children walk freely — when a bike came through at top speed. She was nearly run over. The rider didn’t stop. It was the terrifying realisation of how close it had come.
If it can happen in the middle of a mall to a toddler, it can happen anywhere. And it will keep happening until someone in authority decides that pedestrians — including the smallest and most vulnerable among us — deserve to feel safe in the spaces built for them.
The footpath has always been a space that belonged to pedestrians. That’s worth defending — not out of hostility to cyclists, but out of a commitment to the idea that users of that space deserve protection. Right now, they’re not getting it. Until governments, police, and the platforms that profit from gig economy riders decide that pedestrians matter too, the chaos on our footpaths will get worse. The next two-year-old in a shopping mall might not be as lucky.
Where are the authorities? Aren’t our taxes used to keep us safe? Isn’t this part of law and order, a lack of which often topples governments? If the police are overworked and under resourced to protect us, isn’t this a question for the Ministers of Police in each state? Or is this another case of Yes, Minister?
