|
German vehicle registration plates (''Kraftfahrzeug-Kennzeichen'' or, more colloquially, ''Nummernschilder'') indicate the place where the vehicle bearing them was once registered. Whenever German owners of a motor vehicle change their main place of residence within Germany or buy a car from a person living in a different city or county they have to have the vehicle documentation changed accordingly. In the process owners may opt for new license plates that reflect their place of residence or simply retain the old identifier and plates. The states of Hesse, Schleswig-Holstein, Brandenburg, Saxony, Thuringia and North Rhine-Westphalia were the first ones to create laws so that owners were not obliged anymore to change license plates if they were changing residence within the respective state. A nationwide law has since been passed by the federal government and it comes into effect on January 1, 2015.〔 〕 From this time on, it is generally not possible anymore to tell the owner's place of residence just from looking at the plates. The option to be assigned temporary plates allows owners a financial saving in the case they have vehicles (e.g. motorcycles) which they intend to drive only during one particular part of the year. While temporary plates can only be used for the time printed on them and new ones have to be assigned and bought if the vehicle is supposed to be on public roads later on there is no need to renew regular plates periodically. German motor vehicle tax is paid independently of the license plates by annual direct debit from a bank account. As of 2007, new number plates normally cost around €30, while the cost of de-registering a vehicle and re-registering it with new plates is between €10 and €40. The license plates themselves are not made by the registration office but by independent for-profit stores that are usually located in the same building as the registration office or close by. Upon successful registration the applicant is merely given a slip of paper with the assigned number that can be presented at any store that makes plates. Sometimes there are several stores in the vicinity of the registration office with prices for plates dropping the further the store is away from the registration office. Once the plates are made, which is a matter of minutes, the owner must return to the registration office with them, pay the costs for registration and then the required registration seal and safety test stickers are applied to the plates making them legal for use in traffic. If ownership of a vehicle is permanently transferred to a new owner who lives in the same city/region then the registration number may remain unchanged. Administration fees are, however, still payable in respect of the necessary changes to the vehicle's official documentation. Many people however will change the license plates even if it is not necessary in order to personalize them. ==Format== The present German number plate format has been in use since 1994. As with many plates for countries within the European Union, a blue strip on the left shows a shortened country code in white text (D for ''Deutschland'' = Germany) and the Flag of Europe (12 golden stars forming a circle on a blue background). The rest of the license plate uses black print on a white background. Just after the country code strip is a one, two or three letter abbreviation, which represents the city or region where the car was registered, such as B for Berlin. These letters formerly coincide with the German districts. Since 2013 the letters were extended to former districts ((complete list )). In some cases an urban district and the surrounding non-urban district share the same letter code. Where this happens, the number of the following letters and digits is usually different. For example, the urban district of Straubing (SR) has one letter after the code (SR - A 123). The surrounding district Straubing-Bogen has two letters (SR - AB 123) after the code. However, these different systems are being used in fewer cases, as many cities that share their code with the surrounding rural districts have started using all codes for both districts without any distinction; the city of Regensburg, for example, and the surrounding rural district Regensburg used different systems only until 2007. The number of letters in the city/region prefix code mostly reflects the size of the district. The basic idea was to even out the number of digits on all license plates, because the largest districts would have more digits after the prefix for more cars. The largest German cities generally only have one letter codes (B=Berlin, M=Munich, K=Cologne (''Köln''), F=Frankfurt, L=Leipzig, S=Stuttgart), most other districts in Germany have two or three letter codes. Therefore, cities or districts with fewer letters are generally assumed to be bigger and more important. Reflecting that, most districts tried to get a combination with fewer letters for their prefix code. Districts in eastern Germany usually have more letters, for two reasons: * Fewer people live in eastern German districts, so the number of cars registered is smaller and hence the use of three letter codes. * With the introduction of the current system on 1 July 1956 in then West Germany including Berlin (West), letters had been reserved for all east German districts of that time. However, a lot of those districts were changed over the years, and in 1990 after German reunification, many of the possible shorter combinations had already been used up in western Germany. There are a number of exceptions e.g. Germany's second largest city Hamburg (HH, Hansestadt Hamburg, because of its historical membership in the Hanseatic League, reflected already in its prefix used between 1906 and 1945). Similar is the case of the cities of Bremen and Bremerhaven, forming the state Free Hanseatic City of Bremen, sharing the common prefix HB (1906–1947, and again since 1956), differentiated by the number of letters and digits added. In 1956 also Lübeck received its former prefix HL, already used between 1906 and 1937, when its statehood was abolished. In analogy to these three northwestern cities, but without historical examples of formerly issued prefixes, four northeastern Hanseatic cities, Greifswald, Rostock, Stralsund and Wismar, chose the prefixes HGW, HRO, HST and HWI, since the shorter HG (Hochtaunuskreis, capital: Bad Homburg vor der Höhe), HR (Schwalm-Eder-Kreis, capital: Homberg (Efze)), HS (Kreis Heinsberg) and HW (Kreis Halle in Westphalia) were already taken by west German districts. More west German districts have prefixes derived from the names of their capitals: Ammerland (WST, after Westerstede), Dithmarschen (HEI, after Heide in Dithmarschen), Harburg (WL, after Winsen upon Luhe), Herzogtum Lauenburg (RZ, after Ratzeburg) etc. The letter "G" was reserved for the east German city of Gera, although it is much smaller than the west German Gelsenkirchen ("GE"). The letter "L" had been reserved for Leipzig, but in 1977 it was assigned to the newly formed city of Lahn, and the rural district Lahn-Dill-Kreis. This casts some light on how unlikely a reunification was regarded at that time. In 1990, Leipzig claimed back the letter "L", and it was reassigned, and Lahn-Dill-Kreis had to change to LDK. The reason for this scheme is however not to display size or location, but simply to have enough combinations available within the maximum length of eight characters per plate. After the location name there are the round vehicle safety test and registration seal stickers (see below) placed on top of each other. The registration sticker is the bottom one. For vehicles that are required to bear a front and rear plate the front plate nowadays only features the registration seal sticker. Before 2010, in which year the emission test became a part of the vehicle safety test, the hexagonal emission test sticker was placed above it. The stickers are followed by one or two usually random letters and one to four usually random numbers. The total quantity of letters and numbers on the plate is never higher than eight. Identifiers consisting of one letter with low numbers are normally reserved for motorcycle use since there is less space for plates on these vehicles. A problem with this scheme is that the space between geographic identifier and random letters is a significant character and must be considered when writing down a number. For example, B MW 555 is not the same number as BM W 555. The confusion can be avoided by writing a hyphen after the city code, as in the old number plates, like B-MW 555. For this reason, the police will always radio the location name and spell out the next letters using the German telephone alphabet, which varies somewhat from the English one. Thus, B MW 555 would be radioed as "Berlin, Martha, Wilhelm, fünf-fünf-fünf" and BM W 555 as "Bergheim, Wilhelm, fünf-fünf-fünf". For an extra charge of €10.20 car owners can also register a personalized identifier. Car owners can only choose the numbers or letters instead of the random ones at the end, provided of course they are not yet taken and not a prohibited combination. For example, people living in the town of Pirna might choose ''PIR-AT 77'', "Pirat" being the German for "pirate". Kiel is one of few places (others are Brake (capital of the district of Wesermarsch), Cham, Daun, Emden, Halle, Hamm, Heide, Herne, Hof, Kleve, Kusel, Lauf, Lünen, Pirna, Plön, Regen, Rehau, Selb, Ulm, Unna and Wesel) where the number plate can be the city name: 'KI-EL'. In most cases of personalized plates people choose their initials and a number reflecting their birthdate. In this fashion fictional Mrs. Ulrike Mustermann, born May 2, 1965 and living in Essen would choose 'E UM 2565' for her car. Note that dates are given in the format DDMMYY in Germany. Germany includes diacritical marks in the letters of some codes, that is the letters Ö and Ü. Such a thing is rarely done in other European countries, but also appears on regular Bosnian, Croatian and Serbian(letters Č, Š and Ž), Åland registration plates (letter Å), as well as on Swedish (letters Å, Ä and Ö) and Danish (letters Å, Æ and Ø) personal registration plates. In Germany there are no two codes where the only difference is that one letter O and Q, the only pair of codes with the letters I and J is IL for Landkreis Ilmenau and JL for Landkreis Jerichower Land. BMW, owner of Mini, registers all Mini press/marketing cars in the city of Minden, which holds the code ''MI'', to get "MI-NI" number plates for the cars. BMW itself is based in Munich, yet "M-INI" plates are not possible to issue, as three letters after the district code are not permitted. ===Prohibited combinations=== Various combinations that could be considered politically unacceptable — mainly due to implications relating to Nazi Germany — are disallowed or otherwise avoided.〔(M-AH 8888 ist durchgerutscht ) ''Sueddeutsche Zeitung'', published: 9 October 2015, accessed: 9 October 2015〕 The district Sächsische Schweiz used the name of its main town, Pirna, in its code ''PIR'', to avoid the use of ''SS'', the name of the paramilitary organization; similarly ''SA'' is also unused. Although between 1945 and 1949 the French occupation force used the combination SA followed by the double-digit numbers 01 to 08 for the then seven rural districts in the Saar Protectorate and its capital Saarbrücken. In 2004 in Nuremberg, a car owner was refused a number plate beginning N-PD because of the connection to the political party the NPD. The combinations STA-SI, HEI-L, IZ-AN and WAF-FE are also avoided, to avoid association with Stasi, the Nazi salute, NAZI backwards and the Luftwaffe respectively.. Banned combinations also include the Nazi abbreviations HJ (''Hitlerjugend'', Hitler Youth), NS (''Nationalsozialismus'', National Socialism), SA (''Sturmabteilung''), SS (''Schutzstaffel''), KZ (''Konzentrationslager'', concentration camp) and often SD (''Sicherheitsdienst''). Some registration offices have overlooked this rule by mistake, however, and there are a few cars registered carrying prohibited codes, such as ''B-SS 12''. Some counties also allow these combinations if they are the initials of the owner (e.g., Norbert Schmidt might be able to get XX-NS 1234), but in this case, if the car is sold and re-registered in the same county by the new owner, the number can be changed (otherwise the number stays with the car until it registered in a different area). However, the combination ''HH'' (which could be interpreted as ''Heil Hitler'') is used for the city of Hamburg, first introduced in 1906. It stands for the city's title ''Hansestadt Hamburg'' (Hanseatic City of Hamburg). The combination ''AH'' (which could be interpreted as ''Adolf Hitler'') is used for the district of Borken. It is derived from Ahaus that had an own district until 1974. In Brandenburg no new plates that are related to Hitler, the Hitler salute, other Nazi symbols, etc. can be issued, especially plates that have digits 1888, 8818, 8888 or ending in 88, 888, 188. The combinations AH 18 and HH 18 cannot also be issued to new owners. Other combinations affected are BUL-LE, MO-RD and SU-FF.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=https://195.243.129.188/igv/servlet/Internetgeschaeftsvorfaelle?AUFRUF=WKZ_RSK )〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Vehicle registration plates of Germany」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|