50 nonconsecutive laps in a day isn't even that much, tbh.
As a cabbie, I could drive 25 fares a day, and if I go back to my station after the fare, then I'd drive one lap while driving the customer home and another while going back myself.
That's exactly what I was thinking, anyone who drives for their job could easily be crossing the same traffic circle dozens of times a day. That would be against the law?
Spirit vs intention of law, they wouldn’t be ticketing people who do it for work, it would be for people like OP who have nothing better than be a “menace”.
I’ve thought about getting a few dozen people and just going in a loop around a couple of blocks screwing over the traffic circle. So yeah the laws probably because someone actually decided to do it.
I think you mean spirit vs letter of the law, but yeah, any time you count on cops or courts honoring the 'spirit of the law' you're probably gonna get burned.
Of course with this law nobody is gonna get burned unless they are actually doing laps. Cops don't have time to be counting how many times you went through a traffic circle in a day, they've got people and dogs to kill.
Some of those laws are no longer on the books, so I wonder about that one. Like, what does "around the town square" actually mean? There's not a straightforward "town square" in Oxford. And while the article asks "What exactly happened to make Oxford so protective of its town square?", you and I both know the answer is "drunk college students". Also funny that they don't actually show the public sidewalk, but instead the little square between Elliot and Stoddard for the sidewalk law.
Edit: a quick search through the municipal traffic codes doesn't reveal anything, so I'm guessing this is one of Miami's many rumors that happened to get picked up by a less-than-thourough website. Or potentially it used to exist but no longer does. Or maybe I missed it, but I'm willing to bet that's not the case.
I think the law was from the late 60s-mid 70s when driving muscle cars around was a popular past time for young men. My guess is it's a problem that kinda just went away when other types of entertainment became more popular.