new florida tags

Makes perfect sense.

In addition to the standard Florida license plate, there are more than 100 different Florida tags that are used to raise money for various causes. This vast number of designs must be causing problems, especially if traveling outside Florida.

http://www.flhsmv.gov/dmv/specialtytags/

No surprise there.
Both the misreading of toll cameras & Red-light & speed cameras must be putting a dent in revenues.

Fred

http://www.dmv.state.pa.us/license_plates/plate-special_org....

Pennsylvania has a ton of tags as well, the list above is just the special organization tags, where the background is basically the same with the orgs logo/symbol but they do have others called Special Fund Plates with different backgrounds

http://www.dmv.state.pa.us/license_plates/special_fund.shtml

One of the special fund plates had to be discontinued because it had white numbers/letters on a light colored background and in the daytime you couldn't see most of the numbers/letters, even when fairly close up, they were reflective at night though http://www.plateshack.com/y2k/Pennsylvania/pa2002flagship.jp...

Then there's the military plates, most completely different from the standard one.

http://www.dmv.state.pa.us/militaryCenter/licensePlates.shtm...

It's all about money, the state gets a cut from each non-standard issue plate.

Lots of special tags in TN. They cost twice a much per year. No way our officials will kill that cash cow.

Tags also. Every organization has their special tags.They receive a percentage of the cost over the orginal price of the tags.

Illinois has several tags as well. The numbers on the tags wear out and makes them hard to read.

Anyway to extract more money from people!

http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/10/24/3064148/florida-slams-...

These proposed changes will not have any effect on the availability of specialized tags, they'll simply have to be redesigned. Florida law requires the actual metal license plate to replaced after a specified number of years, they can work the transition in that way.

Just my guess but probably the Governor figures the state will not increase their revenue by re-designing the tag, the counties and municipalities will. They are the ones raking in the money from RLC violators, so let them and the RLC camera operators pay for the new tags.

In PA it's a one time charge, some to the state, some to the org (if it's an org tag) after the initial charge it reverts back to the normal yearly fee. I've heard a few states charge you each time you renew.

PA was doing that every ten years, but with the last changeover they repealed that law. Now it's up to the owner the request (and pay for) a tag replacement for a worn out tag, and if you have a worn out tag you're subject to being stopped by the PD.

I got pulled over about a week ago, I'd guess ~20-40 over the limit. The officer saw my plate, told me to have a good night and watch my speed. Best $20 I ever spent!!

It was a firefighter tag, been told to have a nice day as well as "where's the fire" but let go with a warning.

I have my retired military and animal rescue decals on my back window. Got me out of 3 potential tickets.

What the article failed to mention was the price to implement the new tags. I believe it was several tens of millions of dollars. I think it was over $30 million.

It would take a while to recoup the costs with the increase in RLC revenue.

I agree they'll never get rid of the specialty tags. They make way too much extra revenue off the increased cost.

I think you could create a tag on your computer and get away with it in Florida, unless of course you get stopped......

So you don't accidently take the car by mistake, lol

I've noticed too that Florida has more specialized plates than most states. So one strategy to avoid the Florida camera tickets could be to pick out the specialty plate that's hardest to read. It's just a matter of time, though, before they improve the camera technology so even dark flat plates can be read.

Big Brother is breaking my heart

A lot of states have license plates that are reflective, all the RLC cameras I've seen in my area also have a flash when the photo is taken, lighting the plate up so it can be easily read.

That said, Pennsylvania had to discontinue one of it's special plates because it was so hard to to read, even from 10 feet away. The "Flagship Niagara" plate was a light colored background with white numbers and letters. It was reflective so at night when headlights hit it, or from the flash of a camera you could read it but during the day .....

http://www.plateshack.com/y2k/Pennsylvania/pa2002flagship.jp...

And, all military tags are free. You just pay the normal license plate yearly fee. All of the other organizational plates are charged an additional fee which is split with the organization.

wow....

Pay extra every year but some of it goes to fund State Old Soldiers Home

I still have my 'tags' from when I lived in the state back in 1979. What's funny is my tags are no different then those on Florida vehicles today.

ML

I thought the idea of raised letters and numbers was to make the tag harder to replicate. Might solve one problem and introduce another

it always boils down to revenue

Somebody needs to make a good reproduction of Julie Jones's license plate and start running RLC's.

What about all the specialty tags in Florida? There are like a hundred of them. Do they plan to change those as well?

According to the Tampa Bay Times, "A red-light camera ticket is $158. Of that, the state gets $83 and the remaining $75 is split between municipalities and the camera vendor."

Wow. Why am I not surprised? We need to change plates because someone is having a hard time ticketing us. Millions went into the current plate redesign, and they want to make it ultra simple. Sometimes I wonder if the people making these types of decisions are asleep at the wheel. They are setting themselves and their own families up as well.

Are the plates still made at the State pen?

Perhaps the inmates at the State Penn could design electronic flashes that fit on your license plate & are tripped by flashes by redlight or speed cams!

Nah, just a thought.

Fred

How long before all cars have microchips for identification? Probably not all that far in the future.

No real need for license plates that the police need to "run" on their onboard computer as it will then be able to get all the info in a matter of seconds from an extensive database.

No need to install cameras along our cluttered roadways and intersections that require some mere human to review pictures. Just a speed reading for every car that passes by.

Of course some kind of ID tag will still be attached to the car for the non-authorities (you and I) to see.

But back to the topic.

Here on the north coast during winter, most cars have the front license plate area covered with slush and road snow. So I have to wonder if that causes the ticket count to drop during the snow months.

And yes in Ohio we also have a lot of variations of license plates and it seems that every year more are added to the list.

Let me see: someone is going around and twisting the arms of people to make them pay extra for those personalized or special tags!

In Virginia they are called "Vanity" tags. I wonder why?

BTW I have an Amateur Radio tag and the wife has a "Vanity" tag.

Guess what, vehicles with "Special" tags are not the preferred choice of car thieves. They are too easy to remember by law enforcement or others.

The "microchips" in vehicles onboard drivetrain and body/SRS computers already have your VIN encoded, so I'm positive we'll see that being used remotely before the end of my life. As the onboard WiFi technology gets cheaper with every vehicle it gets used on, plus all of the talk of "smart" vehicle infrastructure it's inevitable, imo. There's a pilot program going on in Virginia to measure emissions when vehicles pass by on an exit ramp (can't remember exactly where) that currently uses tag reader tech for the vehicle ID. SO 20th century (old school).