Here’s my weekly column, which now runs in the Monday paper. Please comment away below.

It’s a buyer’s market for car shoppers, but alert reader Dr. P warns consumers that they might want to prepare themselves for another kind of sticker shock: license-plate renewal fees.

Dr. P bought himself a 2008 Range Rover about a year ago, and he was floored this year to receive a bill for more than $800 to get his tabs renewed.

Under old rules dating to the Ventura administration, Dr. P would have paid no more than $189, but the 2008 transportation bill ended such limits for vehicles that hadn’t previously been registered in Minnesota. The bill’s gas-tax increase and the legislative override of Gov. Tim Pawlenty’s veto grabbed most of the headlines back then, but the removal of the caps and the creation of a faster depreciation schedule (which lowered renewals for some folks) were indeed enacted.

Dr. P thought his tax must be an error, so he called his dealership and even a legislator, but nope.

Renewal fees are based on a percentage of the manufacturer’s suggested retail price plus destination charges, says Roxanne LaDoucer of Driver and Vehicle Services. You can look up that value and a bunch of other things, including the annual tax of any vehicle for which you know the license-plate number, at www.mndriveinfo.org  — and perhaps head off any potential shocks of your own.

WHERE YA HEADED? DEPENDS

On the drive south from Duluth, sometimes you’re told how far it is to Minneapolis, other times to St. Paul, and still other times to the Twin Cities.

Alert reader Mysteray has long wondered why, going so far as to count the number of “Twin Cities” signs (four, he says) on his most recent trip. And just how, he wants to know, can there be a single distance to a pair of cities?

“For the past 20 years or so, states have begun phasing out nicknames such as Twin Cities, Quad Cities, etc.,” said Todd Kramascz, metro spokesman for the Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT), because such names “typically are not recognized by interstate travelers.” Both Minneapolis and St. Paul are on an official nationwide list of “control” cities, he said, so MnDOT now alternates between the two, with “Twin Cities” signs being replaced when they reach the end of their lifespans.

The distances to Minneapolis or St. Paul are the number of miles to the respective downtowns, while the “Twin Cities” signs show the distance to — well, to highway marker 106 on Interstate 35E just south of Grand Avenue in St. Paul. It was picked long ago as a way to split the difference, ­Kramascz said.

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