New number plates for old

In 10 days, car registration plates will undergo the biggest changes in almost 40 years. Here, we reveal how to "read" the new system.

Not since the early 1960s have number plates in the UK undergone such a radical change.

Horseless carriage

The first number plate - A1 - was issued in 1903

New style plates, which appear on 1 September, will show which part of the country a vehicle comes from - cars in Birmingham will have the letter B and owners in Scotland will have the letter S - and the six-month period in which it was registered.

In the sample number plate LA51 PJH:

L stands for London;

A indicates the car was registered at the Wimbledon transport office;

51 shows it was registered between September 2001 and February 2002;

and the last three digits are randomly generated.

The system will be flexible enough to use for many years longer than the current one, which was introduced 20 years ago.

The plates are designed to easily date a vehicle, and to stick in the mind of any eye witnesses to an incident involving a car.

RU 04 SEX

But those hoping for a saucy number plate will be out of luck - transport bosses have banned S-E-X from the system.

No more: It took 20 years to exhaust the old system

Also banned are fancy typefaces. The Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) will introduce standardised lettering to make sure number plates can be better read by speed cameras.

The tables below show what the new codes mean. Although for the sake of simplicity we list AA-AN, for instance, not all letter combinations will be available. In 2010, the age identifier changes to 1* for the March to August period; and 6* for September to February.

For more details, see the DVLA's website in Internet links on the right-hand side of the page.

Local Identifier:
Letter	District	Local office	Codes
A	Anglia	Peterborough	AA-AN
		Norwich	AO-AU
		Ipswich	AV-AY
B	Birmingham	Birmingham	BA-BY
C	Cymru	Cardiff	CA-CO
		Swansea	CP-CV
		Bangor	CW-CY
D	Deeside to Shrewsbury	Chester	DA-DK
		Shrewsbury	DL-DY
E	Essex	Chelmsford	EA-EY
F	Forest and Fens	Nottingham	FA-FP
	Fens	Lincoln	FR-FY
G	Garden of England	Maidstone	GA-GO
		Brighton	GP-GY
H	Hampshire and Dorset	Bournemouth	HA-HJ
		Portsmouth	HK-HY
K		Luton	KA-KL
		Northampton	KM-KY
L	London	Wimbledon	LA-LJ
		Stanmore	LK-LT
		Sidcup	LU-LY
M	Manchester and Merseyside	Manchester	MA-MY
N	North	Newcastle	NA-NO
		Stockton	NP-NY
O	Oxford	Oxford	OA-OY
P	Preston	Preston	PA-PT
		Carlisle	PU-PY
R	Reading	Reading	RA-RY
S	Scotland	Glasgow	SA-SJ
		Edinburgh	SK-SO
		Dundee	SP-ST
		Aberdeen	SU-SW
		Inverness	SX, SY
V	Severn Valley	Worcester	VA-VY
W	West of England	Exeter	WA-WJ
		Truro	WK, WL
		Bristol	WM-WY
Y	Yorkshire	Leeds	YA-YK
		Sheffield	YL-YU
		Beverley	YV-YY

Age Identifier:
Date	Code
Sept 01-Feb 02	51
March 02-Aug 02	02
Sept 02-Feb 03	52
March 03-Aug 03	03
Sept 03-Feb 04	53
March 04-Aug 04	04

This pattern will continue until all combinations are used

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Some of your comments on this story:

Compared with US, this is very clever system. Alternating alpha/numeric/alpha makes plates easier to remember and it eliminates the scramble for new cars by making the 'age identifier' change less apparent. My only criticism is the 'age identifier' could have been set to the year and changed annually.
John Skeels, New York USA

It's disappointing that we have been unable to rid ourselves of the registration date tyranny. Presumably the vested interests of the motor trade did not wish to see the "new number" lever disappear
Robin Pearson, UK

The new system is okay, but I don't like the new font (already to be seen on recent 'Y' regs). Why couldn't they have banned fancy typefaces and kept the existing font?
Richard Potts, UK

Forward thinking by the DVLA and local authorities might have seen the allocation of barcodes to cars. Traffic offenders could be swiped, the code relayed to databases for checks on ownership, tax, outstanding offences, etc.
Noel McPherson, UK

The 'local identifier' section is worthless. My current company car was delivered from a garage more than 200 miles away. Does this mean that I will be treated as a tourist when I drive round my home town?
Darren Prior, UK

It always surprises me that the British, well known for their love of privacy and resistance to national identity cards, drive vehicles that are identifiable from half a mile away.
John, Canada

Who really cares? And if you do - please get out more! I can't see how it really matters. I think those who are bugged about it are those who like to show off the fact that they've got a new car.
Tyler Southgate, UK

This system proves yet again, that we in the UK are just useless at designing numbering systems. The numbering system will loop around in 2051, when '51' and '01' will reappear.
Mari Fleming, UK

Thank goodness we didn't go for the Irish system. Who would ever dream up such a complicated system where "98" on the number plate actually refers to the year 1998. They must find it very difficult.
T Glover, from DW (or should it be MB or WL) Any way, its the Wirral

So I register my new car in Essex, then later sell it to a Scot who takes it home to Glasgow - is he forever branded as an Essex man? Poor chap.
Joan, UK

When we last needed to change the system in the early 80's, they just changed the order of the elements on the plates - letter indicating the year, followed by three random numbers and three letters. What has stopped them using three numbers followed by a single letter and then followed by three letters?
C. Hayton, UK

Spain's old system of identifying where a car came from, (B for Barcelona etc) caused two problems. Firstly, selling a car in a different region lowered it price; secondly a car from Madrid travelling in Barcelona would be a target for vandals.
Ronnie Tilling, Spain

If they had the intention of changing the system, why could they not have made it actually easier to read instead of more difficult. Perhaps one letter to designate a town, rather than a district (because who on earth is going to know that cars from the Severn Valley will start VA?), and then couldn't we just use the year of registration such as 2001 is 01? Or am I just being too simplistic?
Paul Robertson, UK

The only people who should be able to trace the origin of a car are the Police and the DVLA. At the very least, these new plates are an infringement on a car-owners privacy, at worst they may increase the risk of vandalism. Imagine how easy it would be for football supporters in one city to target the vehicles of fans visiting from another city.
Paul Hutton, Scotland

It's better - but could be further improved. Here they use between one and three characters for the city. And instead of having this crazy age identifier, why not keep it simple and have the quarter and year it was registered. 101 = 1st QTR (Jan - Mar) 2001 and so on.
Alan Bentley, Germany

Did somebody say 'European Harmonisation'? No, thought not.
Richard Alderton, UK

What's the problem? It all looks simple to me. Maybe people are too thick to understand change. Just see how long it has taken to try to get rid of the stupid imperial system.
Neil, Kent

A ridiculous half-cocked bodge. Either do a proper system of counties or towns or don't bother.
Stephen, Switzerland/UK

What about dates after 2009? Will the numbers be 510 and 010? And who thought that 0 and 5 were a good idea? I have to feel that the consultation process on this scheme wasn't very extensive.
Gareth Williams, Germany

Surely they could have just used the first three or four letters of the postcode?
Stephen Burgess, UK; Rafael Donnelly of Peterborough proposed the same system

Localisation of number plates is a good idea. In Germany, if you see a car comes from a different city, you tend to give the driver more space because he is less likely to know where he is going and therefore more likely to drive erratically.
Alan, UK in Netherlands

Number plates should be allocated to people on a permanent basis so that the plate can be transferred from one car to another if and when the owner changes the vehicle.
P Bakrania, Northamptonshire

The Irish have been operating the same [regional] system for years and it works very well. The only failing is the ability to identify cars belonging to tourists to the region.
Steven Watterson, Ireland and UK

It's a load of indecipherable gibberish with no obvious or discernible logic to the system. Well done to the bureaucrats and pen pushers!
N Azar, UK

It looks okay to me - as long as everyone sticks to the same font. These italic-styled plates and numbers close together to try and make words are more and more common. It has made the British car registration plate system look tacky compared with those in Europe.
John, Scotland

I don't find the age identifier very intuitive. For example, looking at "53" you'd never guess that the car could have been registered in February 2004. Surely January - June (first six months of year) and July - December (last six months of year) would make more sense?
John Lee, England

As a lifelong Kentish man, I find it extremely offensive that the letter "K" has been allocated to Luton. Where's the logic in that?!
Tim Collins Kent, UK