Not Everyone Happy With New NYS License Plates

When you buy your next new car you are in for a not so pleasant surprise.

Your New York license plate will be a glaring yellow-gold and blue instead of the existing white and blue colored plate.

It is true that gold and blue are our State's official colors. But the change to a bright gold background is making some New York citizens see red.

The initial reason is purely aesthetic.

Even a pre-schooler will tell you that a bright yellow background goes with a lot less colors than a white one. So your first look at your new car and license plate may leave you wishing the powers that be took the same pre-school coloring classes the rest of us did.

To add insult to injury, our state license plate design teams could just have looked back at their own records to find reasons to nix the gory gold. New York state license plates were also blue and gold in the 1970s.

That in itself should have been a clue.

I mean who ever thought the 1970s were a fashion or decorating phase we should revisit?

And the justification for dropping the gold and blue in 1986 was – you guessed it, that it was garish, didn't go with most car paint colors and therefore decreased the aesthetic value of the vehicle. Just goes to prove the truth behind the much quoted statement "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."

The second reason for the strident protest is that initial introduction guidelines for the new plates stated that originally the plates were proposed as a forced change for all drivers, rather than a gradually phased introduction as the plates turned over. This would have meant all New York drivers would have been forced to re-register and switch to the gold plates immediately upon their introduction.

But New York State has at least rescinded the requirement of an immediate mandatory change. They will instead be going with a phased introduction of the new plates, as new plates are purchased.

So for those clinging to their aesthetics and to their existing white and blue plates, you can now transfer your plate to any new vehicle.

The price to register was also increased in an attempt by the state government to garner much needed funds while fighting to balance the growing budget deficit.

Long story short, you will have to re-register in order to add an ugly plate to your car, and you will have to pay more to do it.

This would also mean a new registration number for all of us. Terrific, just what those of us who are already challenged remembering our house street number, would need.

Following the initial announcement, state officials were quite rightly besieged with angry calls and protest rallies.

The onslaught was so great that there was finally an announcement that the legislature had raised the white flag (very color appropriate choice as it happens), to state that the existing white and blue plates would not be changed.

So why is it that today I nearly hit the brakes thinking I was going through an amber light, only to find that it was the new gold license plate on the back of an oversized SUV in my windscreen?

Apparently production was already underway before the proposed change was floated to the public, and the announcement that no change would be made, came too late.

Bottom line? Gold is in, white is out.