How might car registration plates be numbered after the year 2100?

[PTR 444]

Off topic, but that would actually be after March 2051, the two digit year identifier changes twice per year so covers 50 years from the first use of this format in September 2001.

Although there is already a plan for this - The format will go from XXnn XXX to XXX nnXX for the years 2051-2101. I’m talking more about what will happen after then, if we will even have cars and registration plates that far into the future.

 

[Dai Corner]

Maybe by their IPv6 address?

 

[bussnapperwm]

How about xxnnxxyy (so two letters, 2 check numbers, two letters then year ID)

 

[lyndhurst25]

No reason why they can't reuse the number series from 2001 if they wanted to, just not reissuing any registration marks that duplicate any of the few 100 year old vehicles still on the road. It will be obvious by looking whether a car is from 2001 or 2101, with the presence hover engines being the main giveaway.

 

[mmh]

Just swap the parts, like they used to. A non-problem

 

[Yew]

Perhaps a UUID?

 

[Ediswan]

Maybe by their IPv6 address?

How wide would the number plate be ? Good luck getting anybody to remember one of those.

(Sent from a laptop with a working public IPv6 address. I see www.railforums.co.uk has some IPv6 addresses.)

 

[edwin_m]

No reason why they can't reuse the number series from 2001 if they wanted to, just not reissuing any registration marks that duplicate any of the few 100 year old vehicles still on the road. It will be obvious by looking whether a car is from 2001 or 2101, with the presence hover engines being the main giveaway.

There might not be that many 100-year-old vehicles but there could be more 100-year-old registrations, kept on a "cherished" basis much as you see them today that are obviously decades older than the vehicle they are attached to.

 

[Dai Corner]

How wide would the number plate be ? Good luck getting anybody to remember one of those.

(Sent from a laptop with a working public IPv6 address. I see www.railforums.co.uk has some IPv6 addresses.)

Not intended to be human readable. You'd use some device to perform a lookup in a database.

 

[Lewlew]

Will we still have cars in 2100?

 

[PeterC]

Will we still have cars in 2100?

It's a car Jim but not as we know it!

 

[Sm5]

It was decided back in 1985, that in the future, where we are going we wont need roads…

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[Horizon22]

I'd suggest that if its decided not to start again with 01, we starting to reverse when it is placed (01AA AAA)

Or start with letters but that only gives you 26 years (if you split 1-5 to be first half and 6-0 second half)

 

[swt_passenger]

I'd suggest that if its decided not to start again with 01, we starting to reverse when it is placed (01AA AAA)

Or start with letters but that only gives you 26 years (if you split 1-5 to be first half and 6-0 second half)

I think they’d just reverse it to AAA 01 AA. They probably wouldn’t want a group of 5 letters in a row.

AFAICS there’s an obvious precedent in the way the 1964 system was simply reversed, in 1983.

 

[nlogax]

Bit of a MacGuffin, this one. Will traditional cars and roads even exist in 2100 as they do now? I'm highly doubtful.

 

[bussnapperwm]

the year is the year 3000 and delays are still ongoing on the M25 with journey times of up to 40 years through the Dartford Crossing

 

[Factotum]

I think they’d just reverse it to AAA 01 AA. They probably wouldn’t want a group of 5 letters in a row.

AFAICS there’s an obvious precedent in the way the 1964 system was simply reversed, in 1983.

Why do you need year identifiers on the licence plate. We managed without them up until the early sixties and many other countries, most notably the USA do not use them.

 

[plugwash]

No reason why they can't reuse the number series from 2001 if they wanted to, just not reissuing any registration marks that duplicate any of the few 100 year old vehicles still on the road. It will be obvious by looking whether a car is from 2001 or 2101,

The rules since number plates started incorporating dates have been you can put an older plate on a newer vehicle, but not a newer plate on an older vehicle. So unless those rules change it would be perfectly legal to put a 2001 plate on a 2091 vehicle, which may not be so obviously different from a 2101 vehicle.

Of course whether having the number plate be a way to show off the newness of a vehicle is a desirable trait or not is debatable.

 

[PTR 444]

the year is the year 3000 and delays are still ongoing on the M25 with journey times of up to 40 years through the Dartford Crossing

But that doesn’t matter as we’ll all be living underwater by then

 

[Sm5]

Cars might be RFID tagged or equivalent, self driving with onboard and road side sensors.
Registration plates probably wont be required, just scanned.

 

[bussnapperwm]

But that doesn’t matter as we’ll all be living underwater by then

They'll probably drive flux things and there will be boybands, and another one and another one and another one

 

[etr221]

I think they’d just reverse it to AAA 01 AA. They probably wouldn’t want a group of 5 letters in a row.

AFAICS there’s an obvious precedent in the way the 1964 system was simply reversed, in 1983.

That's what's due to happen in 2050...

Wondering if mark OOOOOOO (or do I mean 0000000) will be issued then...

 

[mmh]

Why do you need year identifiers on the licence plate. We managed without them up until the early sixties and many other countries, most notably the USA do not use them.

The motor trade would be very unhappy, and very vocal, if it were proposed to scrap them.

 

[LOL The Irony]

I don't know what number plates will look like in 80 years (I may not even be alive in 80 years), so I'll reform the current system.

It'll consist of;
[2 letter region/service code, 2 digit year, 4 random letters]
Barcode somewhere here for ANPR no. of month

Region codes:

Spoiler

London: LD
South East: SE
South West: SW
EoEngland: EE
West Midlands: WM
East Midlands: EM
North West: NW
Yorks & Humber: YH
North East: NE
Scotland: SC
Wales: CY
N Ireland: NI
Q plate: QQ
Import: OS

Service codes:

Spoiler

Police: PC
Fire: FB
Ambulance*: AM
Coastguard**: CG
Mountain Rescue: MU
Recovery: RR
Governmental: HG
Royal Mail: RM
Railway: BR
Highways: HW
Diplomat: ZZ
Miltary-***
Army: AR
Air Force: AF
Navy: RN

*Includes first responder, air ambulance and patient transport vehicles
**Includes RNLI vehicles
***Emergency service vehicles will use their respective designation, but use military style plate.

I decided to use a 4 letter permutation as it gives 456,976 different combinations for all 28 of the region/service codes (which gives a total of 12,795,328 different registrations per year). If all 456,976 combinations are used for a region or service, the final random letter can be replaced by any number between 1 and 9 in sequence (ZZZZ would go to AAA1, AAA2 etc., allowing for even more registrations). So a registration from today in the North West would look similar to this:


Once we reach a new century, the code will repeat as per present. However, I would plan to introduce a new classic car law, meaning any car over the age of 35 would be classified as a classic and be required to use the current black and silver plate.

 

[Diplodicus]

Just let people choose any random selection of alphanumeric characters excluding 'I' and 'O'. My sleazy EX bro-in-law in Aus drove his male menopausal Toyota penis extention with a numberplate SEKSY. Yeucchhh.

 

[PTR 444]

I don't know what number plates will look like in 80 years (I may not even be alive in 80 years), so I'll reform the current system.

It'll consist of;
[2 letter region/service code, 2 digit year, 4 random letters]
Barcode somewhere here for ANPR no. of month

Region codes:

Spoiler

London: LD
South East: SE
South West: SW
EoEngland: EE
West Midlands: WM
East Midlands: EM
North West: NW
Yorks & Humber: YH
North East: NE
Scotland: SC
Wales: CY
N Ireland: NI
Q plate: QQ
Import: OS

Service codes:

Spoiler

Police: PC
Fire: FB
Ambulance*: AM
Coastguard**: CG
Mountain Rescue: MU
Recovery: RR
Governmental: HG
Royal Mail: RM
Railway: BR
Highways: HW
Diplomat: ZZ
Miltary-***
Army: AR
Air Force: AF
Navy: RN

*Includes first responder, air ambulance and patient transport vehicles
**Includes RNLI vehicles
***Emergency service vehicles will use their respective designation, but use military style plate.

I decided to use a 4 letter permutation as it gives 456,976 different combinations for all 28 of the region/service codes (which gives a total of 12,795,328 different registrations per year). If all 456,976 combinations are used for a region or service, the final random letter can be replaced by any number between 1 and 9 in sequence (ZZZZ would go to AAA1, AAA2 etc., allowing for even more registrations). So a registration from today in the North West would look similar to this:
View attachment 106322

Once we reach a new century, the code will repeat as per present. However, I would plan to introduce a new classic car law, meaning any car over the age of 35 would be classified as a classic and be required to use the current black and silver plate.

Your system would be unworkable as there would be fewer registrations available with only one letter combination allowed for each region. Personally I would keep the current region identifiers but allocate each sub-identifier to a specific locality rather than anywhere in the region. For example, HA-HY can currently be allocated to any vehicle registered in Hampshire and Dorset but I would change it so that HA is for Andover, HB for Bournemouth, HC for Christchurch, HD for Dorchester etc.

 

[edwin_m]

Why do we need region identitifiers at all? In the past it would have been because records were manual and it was impractical to co-ordinate them between different plaes, so to take a random example I assume somewhere in Oldham there was a file with the vehicles with BU registrations. These days it can all be on a central database and those with appropriate permissions could log in and reserve as many plates as they needed.

 

[LOL The Irony]

Your system would be unworkable as there would be fewer registrations available with only one letter combination allowed for each region. Personally I would keep the current region identifiers but allocate each sub-identifier to a specific locality rather than anywhere in the region. For example, HA-HY can currently be allocated to any vehicle registered in Hampshire and Dorset but I would change it so that HA is for Andover, HB for Bournemouth, HC for Christchurch, HD for Dorchester etc.

If you want to know where it was specifically registered, look at the log book. My system runs from January to December, instead of the current system which runs from March to February (for some reason). It also introduces a better classic car system than at present, which doesn't include cars like the Audi Quattro and the Ferrari F40, despite them clearly being classics.

 

[gordonthemoron]

QR Code

 

[Factotum]

The motor trade would be very unhappy, and very vocal, if it were proposed to scrap them.

I didn't realise that the DVLA job description included keeping the motor trade happy