I had a really upsetting encounter while walking along a very narrow footpath in Joo Chiat today, and I genuinely want to know what others think.

My husband and I were walking towards Elijah Pies when a family of four came up behind us on bicycles, a Caucasian father, a Filipino mother, and their two sons. The father had already cycled ahead, while the mother and two boys were behind us.

They were ringing their bicycle bells and we did try to make space where we could, but as you can see from the photo, the path is extremely narrow.  
At one point, one of the boys tried to overtake me and came very close to hitting me. I stopped in time so that he could pass safely.  
We didn’t scold him. We didn’t confront the family. We were prepared to just move on.  
But when his mother caught up with us, she started scolding my husband and me for not making way for her sons, saying her son had almost fallen because we were “blocking the way”.

My husband, who had witnessed the near miss, told her that her son had almost hit me and that I was pregnant.

She responded sarcastically, **“Now she’s pregnant?”**  
I told her calmly that I really was pregnant and that I didn’t want to argue, but she continued. At one point, she said something along the lines of, **“Never mind, next time when you are parents, you will know.”**  
By then, I was in tears.

Honestly, if you don’t care that I almost got hit, fine. We weren’t even asking for an apology. **But why come and scold us?**

We didn’t make an issue out of your son almost hitting me. Why make an issue out of us simply walking on a footpath?

I completely understand that public paths are shared spaces. If there had been enough room, of course we would have made way and let everyone pass. And we did try.

But on a footpath this narrow, where exactly were we expected to go? Into the hedge? Onto the grass around the trees? Towards the road?

I also don’t think ringing a bicycle bell means that the pedestrians in front suddenly have to scramble out of the way so that the cyclist doesn’t have to slow down or wait for a safe opportunity to pass.

I actually looked up LTA’s guidelines afterwards because the encounter made me question whether we had done something wrong.

LTA’s guidance says riders should **always give way to pedestrians**, go slow around others, gently alert others before overtaking, walk their devices in crowded areas, and keep a safe distance from other path users when overtaking.

**Official LTA Rules & Code of Conduct:**  
[https://www.lta.gov.sg/content/ltagov/en/getting\_around/active\_mobility/rules\_and\_public\_education/rules\_and\_code\_of\_conduct.html](https://www.lta.gov.sg/content/ltagov/en/getting_around/active_mobility/rules_and_public_education/rules_and_code_of_conduct.html)

So yes, I understand that ringing the bell was meant to alert us that they wanted to pass. But if there isn’t enough space to overtake safely, surely the answer is to slow down and wait rather than expect pedestrians to somehow get off the path?

What made the whole encounter especially upsetting was being made to feel as though we had done something wrong when, from our perspective, we were simply walking on the footpath and trying our best to accommodate a family cycling behind us.

Maybe what broke my heart was that these were parents themselves. I would have thought that after seeing a child nearly collide with another person, especially after being told that person was pregnant, the instinct would be to de-escalate the situation rather than continue scolding them.

I’m posting the photo because I think it’s important to see just how narrow the path actually was.

**I’m genuinely curious: were we really wrong for not being able to make more space here? What would you have done?**

Were we wrong for not making way for cyclists on this very narrow Joo Chiat footpath?