Licence plates and slogans, past and present

[Capsicum]

Regardless of whether people know New Brunswick, the province or the New Jersey city more, is the "old" Brunswick at all well known?

Some "old" versions of cities are not really well known compared to their new versions -- take New York as compared to old York, for instance.

[SpongeG]

I once saw a Hawaii plate on a van in Vancouver.

I was in London in 2002 and there was a woman driving a huge SUV, like the largest one GM made, trying to park in soho, she had a big crowd watching her try to park, she had American plates too on it. It was just too big for anything.

Last summer driving down the Mckenzie Hwy here in Alberta i saw a small caravan of small RV type vehicles with German license plates, about 3 of them travelling together.

[holhm22]

Originally Posted by SpongeG

I once saw a Hawaii plate on a van in Vancouver.

I was in London in 2002 and there was a woman driving a huge SUV, like the largest one GM made, trying to park in soho, she had a big crowd watching her try to park, she had American plates too on it. It was just too big for anything.

Last summer driving down the Mckenzie Hwy here in Alberta i saw a small caravan of small RV type vehicles with German license plates, about 3 of them travelling together.

Speaking of those Europeans driving over here, last summer in the rockies and in Calgary I came across RV type vehicles as you mentioned, some with German and some with UK plates, as well as a motorcycle with Dutch plates.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by Vixx

Meh I see your point. However, California's plate is pretty dull, Texas' is as well (the links to the previous two designs were great, can't believe they ditched those) I also find the New York, Ohio and Massachusetts ones dull and boring.

Of course there are exceptions. Florida's standard is cool along with the various designs. Pennsylvania's is clean cut and Washington's is really nice.

So I guess I can say its just a mixed bag.

I really liked California's mid-1980s design:



In fact this guy agrees with me (and you, from what I can tell):

https://archives.sfweekly.com/exhibi...-plate-already

[lio45]

FWIW, I own a few of those 1980s "Sun" plates that I gathered while I was living in CA. (I kind of like collecting license plates - and have lots of them.)

Here's my '89 5.0 Mustang wearing it, some 10+ years ago. I don't have the car anymore but I still have the license plate

[Andy6]

Originally Posted by Capsicum

Regardless of whether people know New Brunswick, the province or the New Jersey city more, is the "old" Brunswick at all well known?

Some "old" versions of cities are not really well known compared to their new versions -- take New York as compared to old York, for instance.

One rarely hears much of Foundland anymore.

[MonctonRad]

Originally Posted by Andy6

One rarely hears much of Foundland anymore.

[trebor204]

As anyone seen any Nunavut plates? (outside of Nunavut of course)

I have seen a couple in Winnipeg, however there were common in Ottawa.

The former Southway Inn was a home for visitors from Nunavut, however the motel has now been converted to a retirement residence. I went to the hotel a few years ago and I counted close to half-dozen vehicles with Nunavut plates.


http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/...lose-1.3118706

[GeneralLeeTPHLS]

Nice car you had there lio45! What do you currently own?

[TownGuy]

I like Ontario's generic plate. I've gone with a nice clean look with my car, silver, black tint windows, I don't want some garish looking cartoon plate slapped on to it. Same thing if you have nice vibrant colour, do you want a plate that clashes with it?

[SignalHillHiker]

Originally Posted by TownGuy

I like Ontario's generic plate. I've gone with a nice clean look with my car, silver, black tint windows, I don't want some garish looking cartoon plate slapped on to it. Same thing if you have nice vibrant colour, do you want a plate that clashes with it?

Agreed regarding a silver car, but a brightly coloured one, the clash would be fine. I'd love to have, say, a lime green car with power blue plates. Or a red car with yellow plates. Etc. Same as the local houses.

[vid]

Ontario, despite having the most boring plate in North America, also has the most extensive collection of graphical license plates, which no one here has brought up? Aside from letting anyone with an amateur radio licence get a plate with their call sign on it, which I think is actually free, there are seventy three graphical plates at the moment, and it changes every year. Here are a some of the more interesting ones:


Ontario Square and Round Dance Federation


Canadian Tire's Jumpstart charity


St. John Ambulance (this one is fairly common, as all St. John Ambulance vehicles use it)


Elmer the Safety Elephant (???????)


Masons!


Odd Fellows and Rebekahs (they still exist?)


The Ottawa Valley


OFAH (Ontario's NRA)


Anishinabek Nation


Drapeau Franco-Ontarien avec le slogan en francais


Franco-Ontarien flag with the slogan in English, for those lapsed Francophones.


Nishnawbe Aski Nation


United Empire Loyalists (They're still around??)

This is probably the most common:


The serial is usually a slaughtered spelling of someone's name or a variation of "grandma"


The Lacrosse Hall of Fame


Geocaching!!!!


Lakehead University! Wouldn't you be proud to have one of these? It's one of only 6 post-secondary institutions to have its own plate still, so someone is buying them??

So yeah, Ontario's plates aren't just boring in their basic form, they're boring in their graphical form too!

Also, the serials for all those plates are "##LL##" where the LL is a short form of the name of the plate. Lakehead's is LU, the Toronto Maple Leafs plate is ML, the geocaching plate is GC, etc., so there are just as many serial combinations to go with them.

Ontario however doesn't allow its black on white plates to have custom serials, so trucks with a custom plate have to have blue serials. I actually think the black and white plates look better:

[kwoldtimer]

What is the font used for "ONTARIO" on the modern plates? I find it quite nice.

[vid]

I don't know exactly what font it is, but What the Font suggests Tarocco is close to it. It's mostly likely been modified to look prettier.

[SignalHillHiker]

I like it also.

And the plates are as simple as ours - except we don't have a slogan. We don't even have the ampersand.

[J.OT13]

We can also have the French slogan on regular plates.

Here's the most common ones I've seen;

Trillium



Veteran (needless to say, you have to be a Veteran for this one)



Fire Service



And well, in Ottawa





We have the option of any other Major League Ontario sports teams.

[SignalHillHiker]

The trillium one looks nice.

We only have a handful of special plates.

Veterans:



Can't find a picture, but I believe you can still get them with the provincial flag (not the tricolour) and our blue Forget-Me-Not instead. I remember there was some concern by the Canadian Legion, so not sure if it was stopped. It's on official highway signs still in any event:



Firefighters:



Registered classic cars:



Motorcycles:



Off-road vehicles:

[Capsicum]

Originally Posted by vid

Elmer the Safety Elephant (???????)

Wow, I haven't seen Elmer the Safety Elephant in such a long time. Do they still show him to school kids these days?

[vid]

I'm almost 30 and have no idea who he is, so... maybe? I haven't been in a school (other than to vote) in over a decade now.

[JHikka]

The NB 'Picture Province' slogan was always great but official bilingualism crushed ever seeing that on a plate ever again. Shame.

I've always liked the NB Conservation plates with the salmon.