Immediately on to DBB
Although the RDW intends not to use the names of political parties in license plate combinations, we learned this week that a new license plate series for commercial vehicles will be kicked off with a license plate with ‘BBB’. That series remains rare, because after only 42 copies it was quickly switched to the next letter combination.
Of course, they are not crazy at the Road Transport Agency either, so it was decided a long time ago that ‘sensitive’ letter combinations should not end up in license plates. This applies to incorrect combinations such as KKK and NSB, but also to the names of political parties. There are quite a few in the category ‘abbreviations with three letters’, for example VVD, PVV and SGP. We have known Caroline van der Plas’ BBB for some time now, but that letter combination did not end up on the list of prohibited combinations in time. The license plate series for commercial vehicles announced this week simply started with V-01-BBB.
Blog.kenteken.tv reports that this ‘error’ was quickly corrected. The RDW will immediately stop the -BBB series after V-42-BBB. V-43-BBB to V-99-BBB therefore do not exist, and are not issued. Out of fear, the RDW immediately went a bit too far, kenteken.tv rightly notes: the logical ‘V-**-BBD’ is also skipped, just like all other combinations with two ‘B’s’ and another letter. Instead, counting only started again at V-01-DBB. To be clear: the ‘C’ is not used at all in license plates and the ‘V’ is reserved for commercial vehicles.
In this context, it is nice to know that agricultural vehicles are viewed less closely when it comes to prohibited combinations. Tractors and the like have only had a license plate since 2022, but BBB (just like FVD) is common in that series. Still nice for the tractor drivers who have sympathy for that party. If you are one of the 42 BBB bus drivers for whom this does not apply, there is a solution: the BBB license plate can be exchanged for another copy free of charge.
It will take some time before passenger cars welcome license plates with this setup. First up is the ‘XXX-99-X’ layout, which started for commercial vehicles in 2015 and has now been ‘completed’.
– Thanks for information from Autoweek.nl