Vintage License Plates

[Alcancia]

This plate identifies a vehicle at least 30 years old, is primarily a collector's item, and used for participation in club activities, exhibitions, tours, parades, occasional transportation and similar uses, but is not used for general daily transportation.

I think any pre-1984 vehicle used for "occasional" transportation is perfectly justified to have a vintage plate on. "Collectors" be damned. According to a collectible car buying guide I have, my 1960 Impala is a POS and should be sold for scrap because it's not a 2-door.

Now, to ensure a vintage-tagged vehicle's use is occasional, I actually like the idea of annual mileage limitations. It would prevent the abuse from happening and keep vintage plates around for those that use them as intended. I also think that you shouldn't get a free pass just because your car is old. If you're driving your vintage car cross-county or far enough to exceed some reasonable mileage limitation, then you should have to pony up and put real plates on it. Obviously it's in good mechanical order and should be safe enough to be traveling that far; your car shouldn't have any problems passing age-appropriate emissions and safety.

 

[Bart]

I agree with most of what you said, except for the occasional long trip. I plan to have a nice vintage muscle driver one day that would be capable enough to drive back to Illinois and do Route 66 back. It would most likely be a one shot deal, or maybe something that could be done again 5 or 10 years down the road. Other than that it would be an occasional sunny afternoon or weekend drive. I think a reasonable 5 year mileage limit would be okay. But then again, who's going to come up with that magic mileage number and track it.