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CNPS

posted by [personal profile] bugshaw at 10:21pm on 14/06/2007 under
I had the epochal moment today, where after years of tracking down car number plates sequentially you finally get to spot your own car :-)

I started the day looking for a 305 - which I spotted when walking to lunch. Then on the way back from the pub this evening we passed a 306. With great indulgence, [livejournal.com profile] major_clanger took me on a detour down Perne Road, where I had noted a 307 and 308 previously parked: and they were there again today, ready for spotting! Before heading off to Hills Road where I'd seen a 310, Simon pulled over to the side of the road so I could get out and spot our car's 309. And then I spotted the look on Simon's face as I spotted his car number plate...
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There are 16 comments on this entry. (Reply.)
 

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posted by [identity profile] vicarage.livejournal.com at 10:07pm on 14/06/2007
Is 6 in one day a record?
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posted by [identity profile] bugshaw.livejournal.com at 10:10pm on 14/06/2007
It was only 5 (Hills Road was too dark for me to see if the 310 was there). It seems to go in jumps - I can go a couple of weeks without seeing anything, but there have been 3-4 days when I've seen 5-6 consecutive number plates.
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posted by [identity profile] darth-tigger.livejournal.com at 08:56am on 15/06/2007
I managed ten in one day, when I drove to Glasgow for Confounding Tales. Went from 48 to 58 (the last one being in the hotel car park, which was rather good). Of course, weeks later I'm still only on 59. Bum.
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posted by [identity profile] bugshaw.livejournal.com at 09:52am on 15/06/2007
I went all the way to Glasgow for Worldcon, and all the way back again, without seeing the number I needed. Bah!
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posted by [identity profile] ffutures.livejournal.com at 10:12pm on 14/06/2007
By the time you get to 721 I may still own my current bike...
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posted by [identity profile] bugshaw.livejournal.com at 10:16pm on 14/06/2007
It'll take me four years at the current rate...
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posted by [identity profile] mgspiller.livejournal.com at 11:26pm on 14/06/2007
I suspect there is call for a new variation based on the new number plates soon.
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posted by [identity profile] cynthia1960.livejournal.com at 11:16pm on 14/06/2007
Is there some sort of geographic clustering going on with UK car number plates? Inquiring minds want to know.
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posted by [identity profile] bugshaw.livejournal.com at 06:37am on 15/06/2007
The Count will get back to you shortly...
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posted by [identity profile] aardvark179.livejournal.com at 10:37am on 15/06/2007
The only source of clustering on the number part I can think of would have been due to a dealership getting a large set of registrations at once (as, apart from the low numbered plates that were sold off separately, numbers were allocated within each area sequentially).

Since 2001 the number indicates the six month period the car was registered in, I don't know the allocation system for the three letter id part now used to distinguish between cars from the same six month period and area, and I don't know how many offensive letter combinations are excluded, but spotting roughly 14000 plates is probably a challenge too big even for [livejournal.com profile] bugshaw
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posted by [identity profile] bugshaw.livejournal.com at 11:12am on 15/06/2007
Humph. I was going to write a detailed explanation of the subtleties of information storage in British car number plates and how they ocnvey information about date and place of vehicle registration, but I see Wikipedia has got there already.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_car_number_plates
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posted by [identity profile] aardvark179.livejournal.com at 01:05pm on 15/06/2007
Sark bans cars on its roads, so no number plates exist.

I love Wikipedia sometimes.
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posted by [identity profile] cynthia1960.livejournal.com at 04:24pm on 15/06/2007
Cool. California doesn't seem to have any such rationality behind our plates; it's just sequential and any clustering is at the whim of the CA Department of Motor Vehicles (respect their authority, capricious though it may be!).
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posted by [identity profile] naath.livejournal.com at 10:29am on 15/06/2007
What are the rules to this game?
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posted by [identity profile] bugshaw.livejournal.com at 11:00am on 15/06/2007
A very anally retentive man has written them out in great detail here:
http://www.richardherring.com/cnps.php
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posted by [identity profile] naath.livejournal.com at 05:32pm on 15/06/2007
ah, sounds like fun...
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