License plates...and how some states try to tag you

[elSicomoro]

As a kid, I loved seeing all the different license plates. I've seen them from every state except North Dakota as well as 3 Canadian provinces (Ontario, Quebec and Nova Scotia). I've even seen one on a newer "old" Beetle from the Mexican state of Tlaxcala (near Mexico City).

Did you know that some states will even send you a free or low-cost sample plate? I would love to get my hands on the one that is issued by the Northwest Territories and Nunavut: it's shaped like a polar bear. Very cool. (See the attached photo below.)

From 1979-1997, Missouri had a really boring license plate: it had a maroon background with white lettering, and looked very similar to Arizona's. But this was only for passenger cars...there were various color schemes depending on the type of vehicle you had. For personalized plates for passenger cars, it was a black background with gold lettering (I have it posted around here somewhere...). Your standard pick-up truck got a black plate with white lettering. I think there were like 20 different varieties. In 1997, Missouri finally changed the plate to a more colorful one and made it uniform across all vehicles (except for the specialty plates, for colleges and what not).

Pennsylvania was the first state in the country to have their website address on the license plate...now who the hell is going to write that down while driving? Not to mention, many states are now moving away from the www.state.xx.us addresses.

But I actually started this thread b/c of two issues involving license plates that make some people moving targets.

1. Your county of residence listed on your plate: To my knowledge, this is only used by Tennessee now (Zippyt, can you confirm this?), but I've also seen it used by Ohio and Florida in the past. Let's say that some patrolmen with the Tennessee State Police don't like people from Memphis. So, if your license plate says "Shelby" at the bottom, you're fucked.

2. The back window tag in PA: About 3 or 4 years ago, PennDOT decided to try a pilot program where your license renewal tag would be for your back window instead of your license plate...this was to reduce the theft of the tags off the license plate. And where did they decide to test this program? In Philadelphia...only in Philadelphia County to be specific, which consists only of the City of Philadelphia. A good idea in that tag thefts were apparently a problem here. A bad idea in that Philadelphia has notoriously bad drivers...and the back window tag can make good drivers an easy target for police. Not to mention, the tags fade and fall off your back window. And you're not supposed to tape it back up...PennDOT wants you to pay for a new sticker...greedy bastards! Fortunately, this program is being dropped next month...good thing, b/c my plate is up for renewal in March.

I'm not really sure if there is a point to this thread...I think I just wanted to babble about license plates, county names on license plates and the bullshit here in Philadelphia. That is all.