I agree that the function of the law is more important than the letter of the law. The question then comes to how to enforce the law - since we're on the topic of dogs it's entirely possible that one man's dog can run along beside the bike and not trouble anybody no matter how crowded the trail gets, while another man's dog will chase anything that moves and inflict grievous injury on anyone within biting range. How is law enforcement supposed to tell which dog is which, short of being attacked themselves? Just about everybody seems to think their dog is the perfect pet that wouldn't hurt a fly so no amount of protestation from the owner will prove anything (although, in fairness, one dog owner I encountered called her dog to her when she saw me approaching and held its collar until I was well past, on the basis she said the dog would chase me).

I have seen dogs on trails that were well trained, I've seen dogs that weren't well trained, I've encountered a couple of dogs who practically ran under my wheels and forced me to brake hard even though I was going at barely a moderate jogging pace. The only way a lot of laws can be enforced meaningfully is to impose them upon everybody.

Speeding also came up - while someone like Michael Schumacher might be safe driving much faster than the rest of us once again the traffic police have no way of knowing who is a very highly trained driver, who is a competent driver, who is drunk and who is driving a car they stole. So if they see someone going fast they pull them over. While we might argue that someone like Schumacher should be sent on his way it's much harder to justify not pulling him over to make sure it's not some young oik in a stolen car.