From the archives of Bob Montgomery, motoring historian
IRISH PLATES:
When the members of 'The Motor Car Club' set out to celebrate their new-found freedom by driving from London to Brighton in November 1896, only large road vehicles were required to be registered or licensed.
The new Locomotives and Highways Act of 1896 had introduced some basic regulations for motorists, but there was no system by which they could be traced.
By the time the Motor Car Act of 1903 was introduced at the end of that year, motorists for the first time were subject to an annual requirement to be licensed as well as having to fulfill a new requirement that their vehicles - two, three and four wheeled - must carry an identification mark, or 'registration' by which a vehicle and its owner could be traced. Together with a new maximum speed limit of 20 mph (32 km/h) another new concept was introduced, 'Fines'. These Fines covered driving unlicensed vehicles, reckless driving and speeding. At the same time county councils were appointed to be responsible for the new registration and licensing schemes at a fee to the car owner of £1 for a vehicle registration and 5 shillings for a driver's licence.
Here in Ireland, a system of index marks was introduced for use by county councils for vehicles. At first the 32 counties were allocated 33 two-letter combinations running in more or less alphabetical order. These began with IA and ran to IZ as well as AI, BI and so on. The letters S,V, G and Q were excluded from the system, as was II which could have caused confusion.
Tipperary received two separate marks - FI for its north and HI for its south ridings. Offaly was allocated IR ahead of Leitrim and Limerick which were given IT and IU respectively. The series ended with Wicklow's NI, following which the major cities were given the combinations from OI to WI. Later, XI, YI and ZI were also allocated to the cities.
When eventually a shortage of index marks developed, ZA to ZY were allocated for use as well. By the end of the 1950s, the two-letter, four-figure series had been used up in many areas and three-letter, three- figure combinations were introduced.
In Northern Ireland, two-letter Z combinations ranging from AZ to YZ had also been introduced around the same time as the ZA to ZY combinations had been introduced in the Irish Free State. These continued in use until 1966 when Northern Ireland introduced a three-letter, four-digit system. Under this system the second and third letters identified area and always included either an I or a Z.
The system used by the Irish Free State continued when the Republic of Ireland was established and remained in use until a new system was introduced in January 1987. This new system incorporated a year identifier - the first two digits; one or two letters follow identifying place and these are followed by up to five digits resulting in an identification mark which can contain up to eight digits.
This system brought much-needed clarity to our index mark system and was introduced by then Minister, the late John Boland. Its clarity and simplicity has been much admired by other European countries.