well as a football fan (world game) I am used to these kind of opinion pieces and even articles being reported as researched news pieces based on nothing but stereo types and designed to re-enforce said stereo types and annoy those who are pigeonholed in those types.
You need to let these things slide, there are bad pedestrians, cyclists and even football fans (they usually follow melbourne heart
) out there who ruin it for the majority, because the vast majority do the right thing, that is use these shared pathways with care, looking out for the dog not on a lead, the group of pedestrians walking 3, 4, 5 or even 6 abreast even as you ding your bell, yell "passing" even "excuse me" because in the end its in everyone's interest to avoid a collision and thats what you need to do.
Thats why my average speed tumbles on shared paths and why I tend to stick to roads as I wish to go faster and in most cases on the road people accept there are rules and most stick to them making the roads more predictable in my opinion.
In the end this opinion piece has done what it set out to do, re-enforce opinions of some, infuriate others and spark debate, the age would be spewing that this debate has occurred on this forum and not on their website
Just ignore it and move on, "nothing to see here"