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A standard American license plate is 12 inches long. Typically they have room for 7 characters, with each character (including the tiny amount of space between each character) being about 1.7 inches wide.
This worked fine in the "old days," when most license plates had the format ABC-123. But more and more states have run out of possible combinations and have had to add a character, which means that they either have to eliminate the separation (dash, blank space, state seal, whatever) between letters and numbers, or they have to reduce the size of the characters. Either way, legibility suffers. And then there are some states that have all kinds of graphics, or use weird formats (such as 1AB23CD or something) that make it well-nigh impossible to read and remember a number at quick glance.
The whole purpose of a license plate is to identify a specific vehicle. And there are times (such as when one witnesses a hit-and-run) when it is important to be able to read the plate and remember its numbers at a glance. This is becoming increasingly difficult in more and more states.
I've come to the conclusion that the US should adopt the style of license plates used in Europe. Their plates are 20.5 inches long. Having this much space would allow us to use a standardized national format of ABC-12-34 (including the dashes, for legibility and ease of remembering on sight). This format would take up approximately 15.3 inches. In order to improve legibility, this part of the plate should be black characters on a white or yellow background. On the left side, there could be 2.6 inches of blue background on which each state's two-letter postal code (in white) plus the state flag could be shown. The remaining 2.6 inches, on the right side, could be used for whatever graphic illustration each state wanted to use.
Since license plates are issued by states, it wouldn't be necessary to avoid duplication of numbers between states. However, using this standardized format would make it easy to go to a national system. If you omit the letters B, I, and O (because of their resemblance to the numbers 8, 1, and 0), the format shown above would yield about 121.7 million possible combinations. In order to avoid certain offensive three-letter words, let's say it's actually 120 million. Using 12-ABC-34 yields another 120 million, and using 12-34-ABC gives yet another 120 million, for a total of 360 million possible combinations.
There are approximately 270 million vehicles in the road in America today, so these three formats would allow for all vehicles in use and then some. But in order to allow for future growth, each combination could be used for two vehicles in the country (in different states, of course), so that the number of possible combinations would double to 720 million while having each possible combination be duplicated only once. Alternately, we could use the easiest-to-remember format (which, IMO, is ABC-12-34) and allow each possible combination to be duplicated once in each of five or six regions of the country, roughly balanced by population (and always in different states).
The main benefit I see of doing this is to make it easier to read and remember a license-plate number at a quick glance. Having a standardized format in use nationwide, with dashes to separate numbers and letters, would make it easier for people to know what to look for, and thus remember any given plate at quick glance. And avoiding the clutter of various designs in favor of black on white (or yellow) would make the numbers and letters easily legible. Each state would still be able to exercise their creativity and show whatever symbols of their state they might wish, using the 2.6 inches available on the right side.
A side benefit of making this change would be that no state, not even the most populous ones, would be in any danger of running out of possible combinations for a long time to come. And it would make it much easier to switch to a nationwide numbering system (or at least a regional one) if desired, and thus reducing or eliminating any duplication of numbers throughout the country.
And last but not least . . . European plates are only 4.7 inches high, as compared with 6 inches for American plates. Making the plates "shorter" would make them more streamlined on the front end of a car.
So what do you think? Is this worth doing? Or would you rather keep the existing foot-long plate and have each state decide for themselves how to number it and decorate it?
I love our US plates, Canadian as well. Each state or province designs its plate a differently, some designs are pretty unique and represent the state in some manner. The European plates in contrast, are boring.
Its the Europeans that should copy us, not the other way around.
Actually, the last bastion of American freedom is the Second Amendment. Once it's gone, so is our freedom.
Actually, 9 of the 10 amendments that make up the Bill Of Rights are the last bastion of American freedom. Not just the Trumpesque way of always separating out the 2nd amendment alone.
Actually, the last bastion of American freedom is the Second Amendment. Once it's gone, so is our freedom.
Well that IS a strong argument for a specific shape of metal plaque on the front of cars.
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