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DVLA new car/vehicle registration number format. System introduced on September 2001.

In September 2001, the DVLA (Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency) changed the format to not only establish the year of the vehicle, but to also display the area in which it was originally registered.

The biggest change with the new vehicle registrations was to go from yearly issues to every six months. The new system would then see two new vehicle registration/age identifiers each year.

In 1999, prior to the introduction of the new system, the DVLA were forced to run the remaining six registration numbers (S, T, V, W, X and Y) over a three year period with a new registration every six months. This was to use the up the remaining letters of the alphabet to start the new system on the first letter – “A” – for those who don’t know:).

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The rumors of the electric car’s death have been highly exaggerated.Not only is the electric car on the road, mostly in the form of a hybrid vehicle, but the solar power car is also on the boards.  Solar power cars have been around for a while, usually in university competitions, but they had to have incredibly large solar panels in order to power a tiny race car.Now, the solar power car battery seems to be just around the corner.

Honda’s Plans

You may think that one of the companies making the most money off of gas-powered cars would not welcome the electric car, but Honda is striving to make a more and more efficient solar power car battery.  Not only are they limiting their market to automobiles, but also to all of the uses that solar power can be put to.

Honda isn�??t the only company that’s investing heavily on improving the efficiency of the solar cell.hey opened a manufacturing plant in 2007 to the tune of .5 million (US).  Its sole purpose is to make solar cells to power buildings and vehicles.  They mean to make everything from solar power car batteries to solar power battery packs.

New Material

The key to being able to get solar power moving has been the realization that not only silicon could be used to make a working solar panel.  Silicon has the ability to make energy molecules hang on and acts as a sort of bus in order to transfer these molecules to other places.  They make great conductors.  However, you needed a huge silicon panel to get enough silicon to make something like a solar power car battery.

Now, Honda has another material that also acts as a conductor of solar power into electricity.  Instead of silicon, Honda’s solar cells are made of ultra-thin membrane of copper, indium, gallium and deselenium.  The material is often called CIGS.  Get used to hearing that anocrym.In a few years, when you hear the media talking about CIGS, they don�??t mean the tobacco kind.

When Can I Get It?

There are already tiny solar powered cars that run on a solar power car battery that you can buy and put together.  These “kit cars” are street legal and are usually only two-seaters.They usually can only go about thirty miles an hour.  However, the world’s smallest solar power car that world perfectly is only less than an inch long.

Go here for more about Residential Solar Power and Solar Energy Solutions

By Eric Peters, Automotive Columnist

Governments all over the country are looking for creative ways to increase their cashflow — without a formal tax raise. Instead of filching through everyone’s pockets via a new sales tax or jacking up the real estate assessment — actions that generate outrage among the peasantry, especially as the economy implodes — pols have figured out that they can generate a tsunami of cash simply by imposing and then enforcing traffic laws virtually all of us routinely flout, such as “speeding.”

Of course, this is an old method — but the means are entirely modern. Instead of using one Enos Straight with a radar gun — an individualized process that only allows a single cop to issue one ticket at a time — a “Terminator” like grid of automated enforcement is being erected all across the country. In theory, it could catch every speeder every time.

Huge sums are involved. For example, in the Washington, D.C. suburb of Chevy Chase, MD — a community of 2,000 people with a town budget of .6 million — photo enforcement has goosed ticket revenue from ,000 a month to a quarter-million, according to Chevy Chase Village Manager Geoffrey Biddle.

In Scottsdale, AZ — one of the earliest and most aggressive deployers of automated enforcement technology — the get is close to million annually.

This is serious money — and at a time when overt tax increases have become politically unthinkable in most areas, camera money is a godsend for the local (and state) politicos.

The genius of it, though, is not the money it brings in. It’s the way the public’s own good intentions are mercilessly used against it.

Everyone’s for “safe driving.” And, ipso facto, every traffic law that’s passed is naturally the very essence of “safety.” Thus, anyone who complains is — just as ipso facto — obviously in favor “unsafe driving.”

But we all know this is not so. Few of us, for example, look at a friend/family member issued a ticket for speeding in the same way we look at someone who kited a check or boosted a stereo. Yet both are against the law. True, the former is typically just a civil offense whereas the latter involve criminal charges. Nonetheless, few of us consider a person who gets caught in a radar trap a moral defective. Most of us know, deep down, that such a person has done absolutely nothing wrong at all.

Despite the “safety” hard sell, we know that when virtually everyone ignores or routinely violates a law, the law itself is probably not quite right. Just as most of us don’t steal, rape or kill — or even shoplift — so few of us drive in a manner that is genuinely dangerous. We’re neither homicidal — nor suicidal. The same common sense that keeps most of us from sticking our hands into a running blender or operating a circular saw without eye protection also keeps us behaving reasonably when behind the wheel.

That means we drive at “reasonable and prudent” speeds — most of us, most of the time. Yes, there are exceptions (and it’s these guys who need to be ticketed) but traffic surveys show, consistently, that most drivers (85 percent of us) drive within 5-10 mph of a “natural” speed on any given road. This “natural” speed is what’s conversationally referred to as  the “flow” of traffic; in traffic safety engineering circles, it’s called the 85th percentile speed.

This is the speed that is supposed to correspond to posted maximum speed limits — not in my opinion, but in the carefully calculated reasoning of traffic safety engineers. State and local governments are supposed to adhere to the 85th percentile rule (it is even mandated by law in some cases) yet in practice, posted limits are routinely set 5-10 mph below what they ought to be. What this dirty little trick does is transform the 85 percent of us who drive reasonably and prudently into “speeders” ripe for a piece of payin’ paper — and a fat fine.

If things weren’t so corrupt — that is, set up specifically and deliberately to turn almost all of us into offenders every single time we get behind the wheel — only about 10-15 percent of the drivers out there (those who drive considerably faster than the 85th percentile speed) would ever have to worry about tickets, photo-enforced or not.

Instead, it’s all of us who are in the gunsights — or rather, the camera’s sights.

And, for the most part, it’s become impossible to protest — let alone escape the fleecing. The PR organ grinds out its saccharine message of “safety, safety safety!” — with the full cooperation of the media, which dances around to the tune like monkeys at their master’s feet. The reporters know it’s BS. Even the cop who pulled you over knows it’s BS (follow him a while and just see how rigorously he obeys the posted limit). The judges recite the same old mantra; we pretend to agree — if it means dodging the “points” that come with a ticket for “speeding.”

It’s all a gigantic farce; always has been. But thanks to the efficiency of modern technology, it’s become a lot more lucrative.

The net’s closing fast, too.

It’s still possible to at least try to slip through. One web site, www.photoenforced.com posts a continuously updated list of known photo-enforcement locations. But a public cowed into submission by its own support for anything with “safety” in the tag line — and a government ravenous for “revenue” — bodes for an unhappy future, indeed.

We’re gonna miss old Enos and his radar gun. The odds were much more even back then… .

Comments?
www.ericpetersautos.com (click on “Forum”).

Traffic Tickets: A Tax Increase By Other Means

Further Reading:

• The Effect Of Speed Limits On Actual Travel Speeds
• How To Objectively Identify Unsafe Drivers
• 3 Common Myths About Radar Detectors
• The Hidden Costs Of A Simple Speeding Ticket
• The Traffic Justice Program: We’ll Pay Your Speeding Ticket

By Jim Baxter, NMA President

A federally appointed commission just released a report spelling out the demise of fuel taxes as a means to fund transportation projects. To replace the fuel tax they recommend that all vehicles be equipped with monitoring devices so taxes can be applied on a per mile traveled basis.

The commission was also adamant in its desire to see tolling systems expanded to existing streets, roads, and highways across the country, preferably under corporate control. The news stories that publicized these recommendations failed to mention that this commission was stacked with participants who have promoted or otherwise have a vested interest in monitoring, taxing, and tolling travel on the nation’s highways.

Setting aside the biases, conflicts of interest, and one sided analysis inherent in this commission’s proclamations, it’s useful to review and evaluate the fundamental premise that lead to the establishment of this commission in the first place; fuel taxes are no longer an adequate or viable mechanism to fund transportation projects. And, by extension, fuel taxes should be replaced by a system that applies taxes based on vehicle miles traveled (VMT).

We have a long history of using fuel taxes to fund the building and maintaining of our transportation system. The current system is certainly sophisticated, but it is also simple in concept. Fuel consumption is considered a good indicator of use and the impact on roadway infrastructure. Miles traveled and weight based demands and wear and tear on our highways are reflected in fuel consumption. The fuel taxes are further adjusted to shift costs to those road users that have an exaggerated impact on our highways, for example large trucks.

The first fraudulent assumption is that the fuel tax is not and cannot meet our funding needs. The argument goes, “the public is resistant to increasing the fuel tax and therefore it is not a viable taxing mechanism.” Or “fuel use is declining and with it so are fuel taxes.”

The fuel tax was sufficient to build the Interstate system (and most of the remaining road system) and maintain it all these years, why is it no longer viable?

Second, with a perspective longer than six months it is obvious that fuel use is not declining and even if it was, fuel taxes can be increased to a level that builds and maintains the road system we need.

Could it be the public feels deceived because their governments took money from motorists that was supposed to be spent on highways and instead used it on non-transportation projects? Or, that highway funds were spent (wasted) on projects and programs that returned no real benefit to motorists? If these basic issues of political integrity are not addressed why should motorists expect better from a VMT system of taxation?

Nobody likes increased taxes, but finding a politician that ever lost his or her seat solely for supporting a higher fuel tax would be a challenging task, especially if the funds were devoted to publicly supported projects. The real issue is that the public won’t support increases in the fuel taxes if it believes the money will be squandered or spent on non-highway projects.

Fuel Taxes vs. VMT Taxes
A side by side comparison of fuel taxes versus VMT taxes is revealing.

Ease Of Collection
Fuel taxes are easily and conveniently collected and difficult to circumvent. VMT taxes will require the installation of monitoring devices in 250 million vehicles. An entirely new tax collection infrastructure will need to be invented and implemented. Opportunities to circumvent the VMT taxes appear endless.

Transparency To Taxpayers
Fuel taxes are clearly posted and understood by consumers. Everyone pays the same amount per unit of fuel. Most VMT tax systems envision multiple rates based on location, time of travel, and type of road. Rates would change in real time and be adjusted to discourage travel in certain areas or on certain roads at different times, perhaps by different classes of vehicles.

Flexibility
Fuel taxes can be applied to any fuel, including electricity, and easily collected through centralized systems already established for these purposes.

Trying to collect VMT taxes, after the fact, would be an unmitigated disaster. Setting up a centralized collection system at fueling locations, one that would sort out all the variables, would be a significant challenge. It would also require an additional system for reviewing and ruling on billing disputes. As the complexities increase the opportunities for circumvention also multiply.

Privacy
Our fuel tax system is totally anonymous. It does not involve the monitoring of travel or the activities of any person or vehicle.

By its very nature a VMT taxation scheme would, at minimum, be capable of monitoring and recording the travel of any and all vehicles. It would further be capable of assigning fines and penalties for the violation of traffic laws. These issues alone would create an industry devoted to disabling and manipulating the devices installed to monitor VMT and related activities.

Conservation
Because fuel taxes are sensitive to fuel usage they encourage the use of more fuel efficient vehicles, regardless of the fuel used.

VMT tax systems could be designed to charge different mileage rates for different vehicles. These rates could be adjusted for weight, vehicle type, type of use, and classification of owner. It may even be possible to automatically adjust the rates based on driver inputs; more speed, higher rates etc. A whole new bureaucracy could be created just to make and adjust these rates and then enforce their application, something the fuel tax does automatically and without political bias.

Equity
The fuel tax does not pick winners and losers or discriminate against different groups or classes of fuel users. The tax on a gallon of fuel is the same for every customer. All fuel users have the same stake in the taxes assigned motor fuels.

A VMT tax system could allow different tax rates for different groups and classes of users, lower rates for those groups with political power, higher rates for those less favored groups. The same kind of graduated “progressive” system that characterizes our federal income tax system could be applied to a VMT tax.

Given the opaque nature of the VMT tax and the variations of taxing rates it would become just about impossible for individuals to gauge their tax burden against that of others. Taxes could be continually and incrementally increased for different small subsets of users, thereby avoiding a major confrontation with the driving population at large. “Unpopular” vehicle groups such as motorcycles or expensive sports cars could even be targeted for higher fees when traveling certain routes or at certain times as determined by political interests.

In Conclusion
It’s understandable that certain corporate and political entities, like those represented on the federal commission looking into funding mechanisms for our future transportation needs, would favor a system like taxing vehicle miles traveled.

Such a system would be opaque, subject to infinite manipulation, confusing to the general public, largely unaccountable, costly (and profitable) to implement, expansive of government control, and a source of never ending political tinkering. It would also expedite the shifting of government revenue generation to the driving public, a persistent political objective.

The people on the other end of this long “stick,” the motoring public, might have second thoughts on abandoning the simple, fair, effective, and equitable fuel tax as the means to pay for their streets, roads, and highways.

Why Are Politicians Trying To Kill The Fuel Tax?

Further Reading:

• Why Don’t Politicians Care About Transportation Issues?
• The Effect Of A National Speed Limit On Traffic Safety & Fuel Prices
• Funding Our Highways
• Fuel Economy & Toll Roads: Using One Problem To Solve Another
• EZ-Pass Or EZ-Cash? Why Toll Roads Are A Bad Idea

By James Baxter, NMA President

MADD and its bloated stepmother, NHTSA, have been pushing for mandated ignition interlock devices (IIDs), preferably in all vehicles, but they know from experience these things have to be done in an incremental fashion, or there could be severe public backlash and resistance. One can currently assume that the breathalyzer industry has been actively writing checks to “enhance public safety” through the legislated mandated use of these devices.

The first stage of the incremental process is to target “bad people,” that would be the two million people who receive DUIs, annually. The objective is to force the courts to require the installation in all cars driven by persons convicted of DUI. Obviously, this would be a bonanza for the companies that make and market IIDs. The country’s number one “early adopter,” California, jumped on this bandwagon in the late 1980’s. Subsequently, the CA state legislature had the foresight to insert a provision in the law that required an evaluation of the IID mandate. Here are some of those findings:

Although ordered by the courts to install IIDs, many DUI defendants did not do so, ostensibly because they could not afford to do so.

When comparing the DUI convicted drivers who actually drove vehicles with IIDs to DUI drivers who did not use IIDs, those using IIDs had significantly more crashes. (84 percent more)

First offenders with high BACs, .20 or higher, who were ordered to use IIDs had just as many subsequent DUIs and crashes as those first offenders who were not ordered to install IIDs.

However, the first offenders who actually had IIDs installed had far more crashes than those who did not.

If this measure is being considered for safety purposes, as is claimed by the proponents, why is the legislature considering a mandate that will substantially increase vehicle crashes?

The financial and collateral penalties, experienced by the average person convicted of DUI, ultimately constitute many thousands of dollars and lost educational and vocational opportunities. It hardly seems fair or rational to institute yet another penalty that does little more than benefit the Ignition Interlock Device industry, and body shops, while placing more burdens on hospital emergency rooms. That is, if the intent is to improve highway safety.

The Ignition Interlock Hoax

Further Reading:

• Traffic Tickets Are Big Business
• Tyranny Of The Minority: Why Bad Traffic Laws Get Passed
• Red-Light Cameras Do Not Reduce Right Angle Crashes
• The 4 Types Of Red Light Violations And How To Stop Them
• Bernie Madoff & Red-Light Cameras