Roadguy was so excited about the snow emergencies that he nearly forgot to post his column from the Sunday paper, so here it is:

WITH LICENSE PLATES, SOMETIMES “W” STANDS FOR “WHOOPS”

What do repeat drunken drivers and ham radio operators have in common?

They both might have license plates that start with W.

That was the major lesson of this past week, after Roadguy wrote that plates beginning with W are restricted plates that are subject to impoundment if the driver messes up again. The amateur radio folks — very few of whom are drunken drivers or otherwise in trouble — were quick to let Roadguy know that W doesn’t always stand for “whisky.”

My apologies.

Kris Chapin of the Department of Public Safety, who has been Roadguy’s guide to all things plate-related, was a bit red-faced as well.

She clarified that all restricted plates are plain white with blue lettering and have two letters and four numbers, with the first letter always a W.

The amateur radio plates, meanwhile, have the standard blue-and-white Minnesota plate design, complete with woodsy scene and canoe, “so the distinction is obvious” even if the plate number begins with a W, Chapin said in an e-mail.

Some plates showing a ham radio operator’s call letters start with a W, followed by up to five letters or numbers, she said.

And personalized plates belonging to neither bad drivers nor radio buffs may also begin with W, such as the exuberant “WHEEE” and the even more exuberant “WHEEEEE.” Roadguy sincerely hopes that those drivers stay well below the legal limit.

What about F, S, I, O and Q?

While the radio folks questioned Roadguy’s intelligence, other readers just had more questions. For example, what about S?

For several years, Driver and Vehicle Services has excluded F and S from nonpersonalized plates “because their similar sounds caused problems with our internal voice-recognition system,” Chapin wrote. “However, they’ll start using S (but not F) as they make the transition to flat, digital plates because they need another letter to create more combinations.”

And because of “readability issues for law enforcement,” the letters I, Q and O only appear in personalized plates.

What about unfortunate three-letter combinations that might pop up and resemble four-letter words or otherwise fail to be universally appreciated?

Whenever a new numbering series begins, an internal committee reviews the possible combinations and omits any that might be objectionable, questionable or otherwise eye-opening, said the state folks, who cited DFL and APE as two that wouldn’t make the cut for random assignments.

But before any DFLers write in, relax: You can still request that combination for your personalized plates.

This entry was posted on Sunday, December 2nd, 2007 at 8:40 pm and is filed under Main, WUWT?. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.