Vehicle license plates of the world

[dubart]

Thanks Escher!

[ABRob]

Found this car parking in an ordinary residential road here in town today:

[aby_since82]

Originally Posted by dubart

Can anyone explain what is this little plate (SP) doing on every Spanish bus I see...

Servicio Publico (Public Service)[/QUOTE]

Exact, and MP (Mercancía Propia)

[Leofold]

Turkey

[PLH]

Can you have any font you want or what? (the first one is German)

[Verso]

Istanbul Ferraris are notorious on SSC, particularly in DLM.

[PLH]

What do you want? It's Domus show-off maximae

[Majestic]

Moroccan plates I spotted today in Słupsk. This is insane.

[dubart]

Today in Zadar, Croatia. I've never seen Irish plates here before...

[Palance]

Yesterday I have seen a new French plate in Amstedam, the first new one I actually say (departement 01)

[Muttie]

Originally Posted by Majestic

Moroccan plates I spotted today in Słupsk. This is insane.

Ah, that car has been driving at least 3000 km to get there :P.

[Leofold]

Originally Posted by Verso

Istanbul Ferraris are notorious on SSC, particularly in DLM.

Although many of you wouldn't understand, I found and put this plate because of the meaning of the letters and numbers. FB stands for Fenerbahçe (the football team) and 1907 stands for the year the sports club has been founded. Of course, 34 stands for Istanbul (the 34th city of Turkey by alphabetic order)

You can't have any font you want, it is standart. Only government, military and other official vehicles have different font and colors.

[ChrisZwolle]

The first time I saw American plates outside the embassy hoods.
image hosted on flickr

[brisavoine]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy Llama

France has new system for two days now. Licence plates geeks start hunting

Have anyone seen a new plate yet?

The new licence plates are becoming more and more visible in the streets of Paris. As far as I know, those are the only European licence plates that have a regional logo like the North American licence plates. It's really something of a revolution for Europe and for France. Sometimes when I see the new plates I feel like I've been transported in a North American city.

Contrary to what most people expected, the Parisians haven't chosen provincial regional logos (people are free to choose the logo of whatever region they feel sentimally closer to). So far 95% of the plates I've seen in Paris have the Greater Paris logo, and I must admit it looks very nice. The Greater Paris logo is a red star that was chosen by the Socialists when they won the regional elections in 1998. I used to find that logo ugly, but on the licence plates it looks really neat and stylish. Be prepared to see more and more of these red stars in the future on European roads, as there are more than 5 millions cars registered in Greater Paris, which is the highest number of cars registered in any licence place regional jurisdiction in Europe (North Rhine-Westphalia is more populated than Greater Paris but it is divided into several licence plates districts: K, D, E, BN, etc., with no common symbol or alphanumeric code for the whole state).

The Greater Paris licence plate (this one for the City of Paris proper):


(this one for the Val-d'Oise department in the northern suburbs)


(this one for the Seine-Saint-Denis department, the most multi-ethnic suburb of Paris)


(this one for the Essonne department, in the southern suburbs)


What's great about these new plates is that they really give a sense of belonging to Greater Paris across the departmental borders. It's important to bridge the psychological gap that still exists between the City of Paris proper and the suburbs.

Here an example in the French provinces, this one in Lorraine in eastern France:


This one in French Guiana, in South America:

[ChrisZwolle]

As far as I know, those are the only European licence plates that have a regional logo like the North American licence plates. It's really something of a revolution for Europe and for France. Sometimes when I see the new plates I feel like I've been transported in a North American city.

German plates also have that.

[brisavoine]

It's so small I had never paid attention to it. Honestly it's hard to distinguish those German coat of arms, especially when you drive. It's quite different from the French regional logos that are clearly visible.

On the other hand, I now remember there are canton logos on the Swiss licence plates, which are clearly visible. So the Swiss and now French licence plates are the only ones in Europe as far as I know which have clearly visible regional flags/logos.

[ChrisZwolle]

Austrian plates also have a flag of the subdivision the car is registered.

[ChrisZwolle]

Italian plates too:

[brisavoine]

All of these are very traditional coat of arms though (same as in Germany and Switzerland, must be something of the Mitteleuropa), whereas the new French licence plates have either flags (not coat of arms) or modern logos totally different from the traditional flags/coat of arms. That's why they look more North American to me, the Greater Paris logo in particular (in find the licence plates from the French provinces a bit less stylish, too bulky).

Concerning the Italian licence plates, they don't have a logo, flag or coat of arms, they only have a number and the initials of the prefecture, which is very European:
image hosted on flickr

[dubart]

How come these new French plates are available with at least three different fonts and several varieties of blue colour?! I really don't get it.