License plates on American cars...

Had a Fake British plate made up yrs ago-"CHG 657S" Clarence Henry Geiger, June 1957 Sandy. People STILL ask about it...​
 
That's nice Sandy, but if you put it on a car over here it wouldn't last long these days if it hadn't been actually recorded as issued to you, you'd get flagged by our growing ANPR network, stopped by the police, and told to take it off and put a valid one on. :) Over here you can't 'make up' the lettering on plates and register them, however I understand you can in the US, the standardised plates over here are issued by the DVLA (I think?), although you can reserve a standardised letter/number group if it hasn't been issued yet. :)
 
31 states require front and rear license plates. The 19 that only use a rear plate are: Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, and West Virginia.
 
Along with f&r plates here in Texas, I'll have to drop in for license renewal in person for new picture this week. Good thing I haven't shaved the last several years.
 
That's nice Sandy, but if you put it on a car over here it wouldn't last long these days if it hadn't been actually recorded as issued to you, you'd get flagged by our growing ANPR network, stopped by the police, and told to take it off and put a valid one on. :) Over here you can't 'make up' the lettering on plates and register them, however I understand you can in the US, the standardised plates over here are issued by the DVLA (I think?), although you can reserve a standardised letter/number group if it hasn't been issued yet. :)

Lord Brett Sinclair's Aston Martin ;)


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Depending on individual state statutes, front plates are not always required on passenger vehicles. For trucks (commercial vehicles) they seem to always require a front plate. Here is a summary of the states I've lived in (with my memory being somewhat reliable):

Minnesota - front plate required
Oregon - front plate required
New Mexico - front plate optional
Kansas - front plate optional

Minnesota, front plate is not required for collector registration, or vehicle that could be registered for collector status.
 
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31 states require front and rear license plates. The 19 that only use a rear plate are: Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, and West Virginia.

Indiana ;)

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In PA, they just did away with the Year sticker for the plate when you pay for your yearly registration. Now cops have no idea if you have proper registration without pulling you over to ask for it.

Except that you need your registration to get your state inspection windshield sticker, and they're easier to see anyway.
 
In Nevada you must have the plate displayed both front and back, I believe the only exception is if the car came without a front plate mounting provision from the factory.
 
State by state thing. NJ insists, personally I dislike them. The holders often look like an afterthought. The one on my Lincoln actually looks like it belongs there, the one on the truck does not.

NJ doesn't do plate registration stickers. My truck still has one, but its from 2003. They have plate scanners these days, they know when your registration or insurance is up without pulling you over for it.
 
Tennessee can get away w/.this, w/our state's shape...I THINK they used the design into the Fifties. MOST states can't use their shapes, either easily or abstract..
 
In PA, they just did away with the Year sticker for the plate when you pay for your yearly registration. Now cops have no idea if you have proper registration without pulling you over to ask for it.

Mmmm.... I'm betting that when they pull your plate number up on their computer it lets them know if you're up to date or not.....
 
Mmmm.... I'm betting that when they pull your plate number up on their computer it lets them know if you're up to date or not.....
I guess so, but they will have to put the doughnut and coffee down to check the computer when they could have just looked at the plate.
 
That's nice Sandy, but if you put it on a car over here it wouldn't last long these days if it hadn't been actually recorded as issued to you, you'd get flagged by our growing ANPR network, stopped by the police, and told to take it off and put a valid one on. :) Over here you can't 'make up' the lettering on plates and register them, however I understand you can in the US, the standardised plates over here are issued by the DVLA (I think?), although you can reserve a standardised letter/number group if it hasn't been issued yet. :)

In most states in the US, if you just go to the DMV and register your car, you get whatever plate numbers you get. However in most if not all states, you can get "vanity" plates either with a special plate design (e.g. a background advertising your school), a string of letters and numbers specified by you, or both. In Virginia, I think a vanity plate is something like $25 so they're very common. In other states they're a LOT more expensive... I just haven't had any really clever ideas so I just run the garden variety tags. I did have two Impalas for company cars, I *so* wanted to get tags that said "VLAD" but since it wasn't actually my car I couldn't (and I wasn't about to get one of those miserable POSes for myself just for a pun)
 
I guess so, but they will have to put the doughnut and coffee down to check the computer when they could have just looked at the plate.
unlikely. They probably have the automated scanners that NJ has. It reads, checks, and reports to the officer if the insurance or registration has lapsed without them doing anything. I got pulled over for that once, instead of the usual "do you know why I stopped you?" question I got the "I'm pulling you over because your registration is expired". Turns out it was, and had been for 9 months. I moved and lost the renewal notice, then quite frankly forgot about it. Oops. He was cool. I was almost home and basically he said "get it out of here, don't let me see you do it". He left, I left, the next day I went and took care of the renewal.
 
Yearly registration stickers too...though folks get creative about where to place them.
In Michigan there are clear instructions where to place the renewal sticker on the plate. Yet apparently there are some who didn't get the memo (or can't read), and stick them wherever, even in the middle between the letters or numbers.
It reads, checks, and reports to the officer if the insurance or registration has lapsed without them doing anything.
That is one thing that irritates me locally--there are a ton of uninsured drivers yet, far as I know, the police departments do NOT have insurance data available so they can check it. They rely on whatever piece of paper you give them as proof of insurance. The problem here is that in Detroit, I think it is one in two drivers do not have auto insurance. There are even companies here that let you buy a 7 day policy so you can get your plates renewed. (There was recent talk of shutting those insurance companies down...I hope they made progress on it.) So now all of us have to pay higher premiums due to uninsured drivers. And with higher rates, fewer can afford insurance...which drives prices even higher. That and the insurance lobbyists have made Michigan the most expensive state to insure a car in. Can't wait to move. There is no reason that insuring my car should cost double my car payment (and me, with no insurance claims in 17 years!!). Hate this state.
 
In general conservative (cut all cost) states have gotten rid of them. More progressive/liberal states, where police unions still have some power, tend to have front plates.
 
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