vehicles 0.4.1 → 0.8.0

data/data/plates/au-qld.yml

@@ -0,0 +1,272 @@
+# plates/au-qld.yml — Queensland (PRD-PLATES gate L3, Australia).
+#
+# QUEENSLAND IS THE AUSTRALIAN JURISDICTION WHERE THE LAW AND THE AGENCY BOTH
+# TALK. Two primaries carry this file:
+#
+# 1. THE INSTRUMENT — Transport Operations (Road Use Management—Vehicle
+#    Registration) Regulation 2021 (Qld), SL 2021 No. 113, made under the
+#    Transport Operations (Road Use Management) Act 1995, s 2: "This regulation
+#    commences on 1 September 2021." Read in full from the Queensland
+#    Parliamentary Counsel's own XML (1.5 MB, reprint current as at
+#    2026-08-01). It gives, verbatim and in terms: who gets how many plates
+#    (s 117), where they go and how visible they must be (s 118), the dealer
+#    plate (s 77), the personalised plate (ss 132-133) — and, exactly as in
+#    every other Australian jurisdiction, NO SERIAL GRAMMAR AT ALL.
+#
+# 2. THE MINISTER — a media statement of the Minister for Transport and Main
+#    Roads published on the Queensland Cabinet and Ministerial Directory,
+#    dated Sunday 1 July 2018, which states the OLD format, the NEW format and
+#    the old format's start year in the Minister's own quoted words. It is the
+#    single best format source obtained for any Australian State in this wave,
+#    and it is why au-qld-standard-3n3l carries an authority-dated 1977 start
+#    while the equivalent series in NSW and SA carry locator dates.
+#
+# WHAT THE MINISTER DID NOT SAY, and it matters: he announced the new
+# combination without a start date ("Transport and Main Roads has been working
+# on a solution for some time and has developed a new combination for the
+# future"). The 2020 changeover below is therefore the LOCATOR's date, flagged,
+# while the FORMAT is the Minister's. Splitting those two claims apart — same
+# series, different evidence grades — is the whole discipline.
+#
+# SEPARATOR NOTE (PRD-PLATES §2.6): the Minister writes the new combination
+# "456-BZ8" with a hyphen; the plate prints a gap, not a hyphen. `pattern` and
+# `regex` spell the printed form with an optional emitted SPACE, per §2.6
+# rule 2, and a forgiving consumer deletes the Minister's hyphen anyway.
+jurisdiction: au-qld
+authority:
+  name: Department of Transport and Main Roads (Queensland)
+  url: "https://www.qld.gov.au/transport/registration/numberplate"
+binding: vehicle
+binding_note: >-
+  The plate binds to the vehicle, but the personalised COMBINATION binds to a
+  person: reg 2021 s 133(1), verbatim — "The right to use the combination of
+  numbers or letters on a personalised number plate is the property of the
+  person to whom the chief executive gives the plate."
+instrument:
+  citation: "Transport Operations (Road Use Management—Vehicle Registration) Regulation 2021 (Qld), SL 2021 No. 113, made under the Transport Operations (Road Use Management) Act 1995 (Qld) (act-1995-009)"
+  commencement: "s 2, verbatim: 'This regulation commences on 1 September 2021.'"
+  reprint_read: "reprint current as at 2026-08-01 (publication.date attribute of the OQPC XML), administering department recorded in the instrument as 'Department of Transport and Main Roads'"
+  stage_repeal: "the instrument carries an automatic expiry date of 1 September 2031 (stage repeal) — a Queensland drafting convention, not a plate fact, recorded so nobody reads it as a series end"
+  source: "https://www.legislation.qld.gov.au/view/whole/html/inforce/current/sl-2021-0113  # the whole regulation; read as OQPC XML at /view/whole/xml/inforce/current/sl-2021-0113 on 2026-08-02"
+  licence: "Queensland legislation is published by the Office of the Queensland Parliamentary Counsel; the site's robots.txt permits the /view/whole/ paths used here. Edicts of government — quoted, not embedded (PRD-PLATES §4)"
+
+national_schemes:
+  heavy_vehicle: >-
+    QUEENSLAND'S REGULATION IS WHERE THE NATIONAL HEAVY-VEHICLE PLATE IS
+    VISIBLE IN LAW. Reg 2021 s 117(2), verbatim, disapplies the ordinary
+    plate-issue duty where "(a) the vehicle is a category 2 vehicle; and (b) the
+    vehicle is equivalently registered in the applicant's name; and (c) a
+    national heavy vehicle number plate has been given for the vehicle." Part 6
+    Division 3 then provides for national heavy vehicle number plates becoming
+    "the current number plates for the vehicle", at which point "the original
+    number plates stop being effective". So the national scheme is a mechanism
+    that SUPERSEDES a State plate on the same vehicle. NO SERIES IS AUTHORED:
+    the national heavy-vehicle serial grammar was not obtained from the NHVR or
+    any State instrument (recorded gap, L4).
+  light_vehicle_standards: >-
+    Australian Light Vehicle Standards Rules 2015 (national MODEL law,
+    Parliamentary Counsel's Committee, consolidated 22 March 2019) rule 86,
+    verbatim: "At least 1 number plate light must be fitted to the rear of a
+    vehicle." The Rules "do not, by themselves, have any legal effect" and
+    prescribe no plate dimension, colour or grammar.
+  source: "https://www.pcc.gov.au/uniform/Australian%20Light%20Vehicle%20Standards%20Rules%202015%20-%2022%20March%202019.pdf  # ALVSR 2015 rule 86 and the model-law disclaimer, accessed 2026-08-02"
+
+# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
+# Display rules — straight out of the instrument, and the most detailed set
+# obtained anywhere in the Australian wave.
+# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
+display_rules:
+  issue: "s 117(1), verbatim: on granting a registration application the chief executive must '(a) assign a registration number to the vehicle; and (b) give the registered operator of the vehicle— (i) if the vehicle is a motorbike, motorised mobility device, quad bike or trailer—1 number plate displaying the registration number for the vehicle; or (ii) otherwise—2 number plates displaying the registration number for the vehicle.'"
+  position: "s 118(1): two plates go one front, one rear; with an approval under s 142A only one rear plate is required; a single-plate vehicle displays it at the rear. s 118(2)(a): each plate must be 'in an upright position parallel to the vehicle's axles' and 'not more than 1.3m above ground level'"
+  visibility: "s 118(2)(b): the characters must be 'visible from 20m away at any point within an arc of 45° from the surface of the number plate above or to either side of the vehicle', as shown in the two figures printed in the section"
+  covers: "s 118(2)(c): any cover 'is clear, clean, untinted and flat over its entire surface' and has no characteristics preventing 'the successful operation of a photographic detection device' or the plate 'from being legible'"
+  load_rule: "s 118(3): characters 'are taken not to be visible ... if a load on the vehicle obscures any part of the characters'"
+  towing_exceptions: "s 119 excuses the rear-plate visibility rule where a towed vehicle obscures it and the towed vehicle itself displays a compliant plate — with a distinct rule for tow trucks towing unregistered vehicles"
+  penalties: "s 118(1) maximum 12 penalty units; s 118(2) maximum 40 penalty units"
+  sources:
+    - "https://www.legislation.qld.gov.au/view/whole/html/inforce/current/sl-2021-0113  # Transport Operations (Road Use Management—Vehicle Registration) Regulation 2021 (Qld) ss 117, 118, 119 (accessed 2026-08-02)"
+
+series:
+
+  # =========================================================================
+  # CURRENT GENERAL ISSUE — the format is the Minister's, the date is not.
+  # =========================================================================
+  - id: au-qld-standard
+    class: standard
+    categories: [car, van, truck, bus, motorcycle, trailer]
+    period: { start: 2020 }        # FORMAT: Minister, 2018. DATE: locator.
+                                   # The two are separated in notes.
+    period_evidence: secondary-locator-unverified
+    matching: strict
+    format:
+      pattern: "999 LL9"
+      regex: '\A\d{3} ?[A-Z]{2}\d\z'
+      evidence: authority
+      charset:
+        notes: >-
+          Minister for Transport and Main Roads, media statement of 1 July 2018,
+          verbatim: "The new plates will feature three numbers followed by two
+          letters and a further number (eg. 456-BZ8)." And: "This format meets
+          regulatory requirements and will be unique to Queensland." Six
+          characters. NO LETTER OR DIGIT EXCLUSIONS ARE STATED by the Minister
+          or by the department, so no `regex_strict` is written; the claim
+          repeated on the enthusiast web that Queensland skips 0 and 1 in the
+          suffix is UNSOURCED and deliberately not encoded.
+      security_feature: "the same statement, verbatim: 'A unique directional security mark is one of the design features being considered for inclusion on the new plates' — CONSIDERED, not adopted, in 2018; whether it shipped is unverified and is not recorded as a design fact"
+    design:
+      colour_note: >-
+        Maroon characters on a white retroreflective ground. THE DEPARTMENT
+        PUBLISHES NO COLOUR SPEC and the Minister named none; the colour words
+        are the locator's and are corroborated only by the Minister's separate
+        remark that the PREVIOUS series "changed colour back in 2001". No hex is
+        recorded — Queensland maroon is a State identity colour with a real
+        value somewhere in Queensland Government brand guidance, and guessing it
+        would be inventing a fact.
+      plate: { w: 372, h: 134, unit: mm }
+      plate_dimension_note: "the cross-State Australian passenger size sourced in plates/au-wa.yml and plates/au-nt.yml; TMR publishes no millimetres of its own (recorded gap)"
+      legend_bottom: "QUEENSLAND, with the State slogan"
+      rear_differs: false
+    region_encoding: none
+    sources:
+      - "https://web.archive.org/web/20180701170407/http://statements.qld.gov.au/Statement/2018/7/1/new-combination-seals-queensland-number-plate-future  # 'New combination seals Queensland number plate future', Minister for Transport and Main Roads the Hon. Mark Bailey, Queensland Cabinet and Ministerial Directory, Sunday 1 July 2018 (read via the Internet Archive, accessed 2026-08-02): the new three-numeral/two-letter/one-numeral combination with the worked example, the 'unique to Queensland' claim, the directional security mark under consideration, and the Y/Z-series exhaustion timeline"
+      - "https://www.legislation.qld.gov.au/view/whole/html/inforce/current/sl-2021-0113  # reg 2021 s 117: the chief executive assigns the registration number and issues one or two plates — the grammar is nowhere in the instrument, which is the negative half of the sourcing story"
+      - "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Queensland  # LOCATOR ONLY (PRD-PLATES §4), accessed 2026-08-02: the September 2020 first issue of this series. Uncited in the article; used as a finding aid and flagged, not asserted"
+    notes: >-
+      QUEENSLAND'S CURRENT GENERAL ISSUE, WITH ITS TWO CLAIMS GRADED
+      SEPARATELY. THE FORMAT IS AUTHORITY-SOURCED: a serving Minister described
+      it in a dated government media statement, with a worked example, two years
+      before it entered issue. THE START DATE IS NOT: the Minister gave no
+      commencement, and the September 2020 figure comes from an uncited locator
+      row, hence `period_evidence: secondary-locator-unverified` on a series
+      whose `format.evidence` is `authority`. The Minister's own timeline is the
+      best independent check available and it is consistent: "My department has
+      started issuing Y series plates and we expect the Z series will start
+      being issued next year and run into early 2020" — i.e. the predecessor was
+      forecast in 2018 to exhaust in early 2020, and the locator says the
+      successor began in September 2020. Consistent is not the same as sourced,
+      and the file says so. THE ID IS UNDATED for the us-fl-standard reason:
+      a dated id minted on a locator boundary cannot be withdrawn later.
+
+  # =========================================================================
+  # ONE SERIES BACK — and this one the Minister dated himself.
+  # =========================================================================
+  - id: au-qld-standard-3n3l
+    class: standard
+    categories: [car, van, truck, bus, motorcycle, trailer]
+    period: { start: 1977, end: 2020 }
+    period_evidence: authority-announcement
+    matching: strict
+    format:
+      pattern: "999 LLL"
+      regex: '\A\d{3} ?[A-Z]{3}\z'
+      evidence: authority
+      charset: { notes: "Minister, 1 July 2018, verbatim: 'Queensland's current motor vehicle number plate series, which includes a combination of three numbers followed by three letters, is coming to an end after 40 years in production'" }
+      progression: "ascending through the three-letter suffix; the Minister's 2018 statement places the run at the Y block ('My department has started issuing Y series plates and we expect the Z series will start being issued next year and run into early 2020'), which is an agency-published serial-to-year anchor of the kind almost no jurisdiction gives"
+    design:
+      colour_note: "the Minister, verbatim: 'The current plate series started in 1977 and changed colour back in 2001.' The colour VALUES on either side of 2001 are not stated by him and are not recorded here; what is recorded is that a colour change happened MID-SERIES in 2001 and did not start a new series — the same modelling point Victoria's 1995 blue makes"
+      plate: { w: 372, h: 134, unit: mm }
+    region_encoding: none
+    sources:
+      - "https://web.archive.org/web/20180701170407/http://statements.qld.gov.au/Statement/2018/7/1/new-combination-seals-queensland-number-plate-future  # the Minister, verbatim: 'The current plate series started in 1977 and changed colour back in 2001'; 'three numbers followed by three letters'; 'after 40 years in production'; the Y/Z series exhaustion forecast (accessed 2026-08-02 via the Internet Archive)"
+      - "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Queensland  # LOCATOR ONLY: the 2020 end. Flagged, not asserted"
+    notes: >-
+      THE PREVIOUS QUEENSLAND GENERAL ISSUE, AND THE BEST-DATED "ONE SERIES
+      BACK" IN THE AUSTRALIAN WAVE. `period.start: 1977` is not a locator claim
+      and not an inference: a serving Transport Minister stated it in a dated
+      government publication, twice over ("started in 1977", "after 40 years in
+      production" — 1977 + 40 = 2017/18, which is internally consistent with the
+      statement's own date). That is why `period_evidence:
+      authority-announcement` rather than the secondary grades that the NSW,
+      SA and TAS one-back series carry. The END is the locator's and is flagged.
+      The 2001 mid-series colour change is recorded on the design rather than
+      used to split the series, because a colour-only variant of the same
+      format and period is a sub-entry, not a series (PRD-PLATES §2.3).
+
+  # =========================================================================
+  # PERSONALISED — the framework is in the instrument, and the instrument
+  # points at a website for the fee, which is worth recording as-is.
+  # =========================================================================
+  - id: au-qld-personalised
+    class: personalized
+    categories: [car, van, truck, motorcycle, trailer]
+    period: { start: 2021 }        # UPPER BOUND: the CURRENT framework's
+                                   # instrument. The programme is far older.
+    period_evidence: instrument-in-force-upper-bound
+    matching: recall-only
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLLLLL"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z0-9]{1,7}( ?[A-Z0-9]{1,7})?\z'
+      evidence: none
+      charset:
+        notes: >-
+          Owner-chosen. Reg 2021 s 132(1), verbatim: "A person may apply to the
+          chief executive for a number plate containing a combination of numbers
+          or letters chosen by the person (a personalised number plate)." The
+          instrument sets NO length, NO alphabet and NO arrangement — the only
+          hard constraint it imposes is uniqueness, s 132(6): "The chief
+          executive must not give a person a personalised number plate whose
+          combination of numbers or letters is identical, or appears to be
+          identical, to the combination of numbers or letters of another current
+          number plate." Note "appears to be identical", which reaches
+          lookalikes and is a real content rule with no published lookalike
+          table (recorded gap). `matching: recall-only` because the regex is a
+          deliberate catch-all over the serial alphabet.
+      uniqueness_rule: "s 132(6), quoted above — the one constraint the law actually imposes"
+    design:
+      note: "designs are the supplier's catalogue, not the instrument's; individual personalised DESIGNS are out of scope at this gate (PRD-PLATES §2.5)"
+    programme:
+      operator: "Personalised Plates Queensland (PPQ)"
+      statutory_hook: >-
+        THE DELIGHTFUL PART, AND A GENUINE MODELLING LESSON: the regulation
+        defines the fee BY REFERENCE TO A COMMERCIAL WEBSITE. Reg 2021 s 132(7),
+        verbatim: "published fee, for a personalised number plate, means the fee
+        stated for the plate on the website located at www.ppq.com.au." A
+        Queensland statutory instrument names a domain. That makes PPQ's site an
+        instrument-incorporated source rather than a mere vendor page — and it
+        means a dataset that ignores the vendor is ignoring something the law
+        points at.
+      auction: "s 132(4): the chief executive 'may give a personalised number plate to a person on a sale of the plate at public auction'"
+      ownership: "s 133(1): 'The right to use the combination of numbers or letters on a personalised number plate is the property of the person to whom the chief executive gives the plate.'"
+    region_encoding: none
+    sources:
+      - "https://www.legislation.qld.gov.au/view/whole/html/inforce/current/sl-2021-0113  # reg 2021 ss 132-133 (accessed 2026-08-02): the personalised-plate application, the published-fee definition naming www.ppq.com.au, the auction limb, the uniqueness rule and the property-in-the-combination rule"
+    notes: >-
+      QUEENSLAND PERSONALISED PLATES. `period.start: 2021` IS AN UPPER BOUND AND
+      NOTHING MORE: it is the commencement of the CURRENT regulation, and
+      Queensland has run personalised plates for decades under predecessor
+      instruments that were not read in this pass (recorded gap). Dating a
+      programme by the instrument that most recently restates it is the
+      instrument-date disease PRD-PLATES §4 names, so it is labelled
+      `instrument-in-force-upper-bound` rather than dressed up as a start.
+      Modelled as its own series because the SERIAL SOURCE differs — owner-chosen
+      rather than department-assigned — which is a format property even where
+      the physical plate is identical.
+
+  # =========================================================================
+  # DEALER PLATES — one sentence of law, and it is the whole series.
+  # =========================================================================
+  - id: au-qld-dealer
+    class: dealer
+    categories: [car, van, truck, bus, motorcycle, trailer]
+    period: { start: 2021 }        # UPPER BOUND: current instrument only.
+    period_evidence: instrument-in-force-upper-bound
+    matching: recall-only
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLLLLL"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z0-9]{1,7}( ?[A-Z0-9]{1,7})?\z'
+      evidence: none
+      charset: { notes: "NOT PUBLISHED. Reg 2021 s 77, verbatim and in its entirety: 'The chief executive may designate a number plate as a dealer plate.' That is the whole provision — a dealer plate is an ORDINARY number plate with an administrative designation, so the instrument gives no distinct grammar and none is invented. Catch-all regex, recall-only" }
+    binding: business
+    binding_note: "reg 2021 s 6(1)(b): the registered operator 'for a dealer plate—is the person in whose name the dealer plate is currently registered'; s 6(2) declares that a person in whose name a dealer plate is equivalently registered is NOT the registered operator. The plate follows the business, not a vehicle — the German rote-Kennzeichen and Florida dealer-plate pattern"
+    use_rule: "reg 2021 s 10(2)(g): an unregistered vehicle may be used on a road if it is 'being used with a registered dealer plate attached to it under section 96'; s 105 requires a registered dealer plate to be attached 'in the same way as a number plate', i.e. 'as if the dealer plate were the only number plate given for the vehicle'"
+    region_encoding: none
+    sources:
+      - "https://www.legislation.qld.gov.au/view/whole/html/inforce/current/sl-2021-0113  # reg 2021 s 77 (designation), s 6(1)(b) and 6(2) (who the registered operator is), s 10(2)(g) (unregistered use), and the attachment rule requiring a dealer plate to be attached as if it were the vehicle's only number plate (accessed 2026-08-02)"
+    notes: >-
+      QUEENSLAND DEALER PLATES, AUTHORED BECAUSE THE LAW CREATES THEM AND
+      DELIBERATELY THIN BECAUSE THE LAW SAYS NOTHING ELSE ABOUT THEM. s 77 is a
+      single sentence; there is no colour, no legend, no grammar, no dimension
+      anywhere in the instrument. `binding: business` is the interesting fact
+      and it is sourced twice (s 6(1)(b) and the s 6(2) declaration). The
+      period is an upper bound for the same reason as the personalised series:
+      dealer plates plainly predate a 2021 regulation.

data/data/plates/au-sa.yml

@@ -0,0 +1,248 @@
+# plates/au-sa.yml — South Australia (PRD-PLATES gate L3, Australia).
+#
+# SOUTH AUSTRALIA IS THE JURISDICTION WHERE THE BEST SOURCE IS TWENTY-TWO
+# YEARS OLD. The current Department for Infrastructure and Transport pages,
+# read in full on 2026-08-02, describe how to order, replace, renew and DISPLAY
+# a plate and never once say what a South Australian general-issue plate looks
+# like. The one government page that does is the ARCHIVED Transport SA page
+# "Alpha-numeric plates (general issue)", captured 6 December 2004, which
+# states the colours and the slogan of the general issue in the department's
+# own words. It is quoted below and dated honestly: what it evidences is the
+# 2004 state of the general issue, not today's.
+#
+# THE OTHER SOUTH AUSTRALIAN PECULIARITY, and it is a good one: the State's
+# personalised-plate operation runs on a GOVERNMENT DOMAIN — ezyplates.sa.gov.au
+# — which makes the one published South Australian serial constraint in this
+# file ("a combination of 1 to 7 characters") an authority statement rather
+# than a vendor's marketing. Compare Queensland, where the regulation itself
+# names a commercial domain (see plates/au-qld.yml, reg 2021 s 132(7)).
+#
+# SOURCING GAP STATED UP FRONT: legislation.sa.gov.au sits behind a Cloudflare
+# managed challenge that returns HTTP 403 to every non-browser client, and the
+# Internet Archive holds no snapshot of the Motor Vehicles Regulations' view
+# URL. NO SOUTH AUSTRALIAN INSTRUMENT IS QUOTED IN THIS FILE. The display rules
+# below come from the department's own public page, which is a primary
+# authority publication (PRD-PLATES §4) but is not the instrument.
+#
+# LICENCE NOTE, recorded because it is unusually clean: SA.GOV.AU states on
+# every page, verbatim, "SA.GOV.AU is licensed under a Creative Commons
+# Attribution 4.0 Licence." A CC BY 4.0 government source is directly
+# compatible with this dataset's own licence — the only such statement found
+# in the Australian wave.
+jurisdiction: au-sa
+authority:
+  name: Department for Infrastructure and Transport (South Australia)
+  url: "https://www.sa.gov.au/topics/driving-and-transport/registration/number-plates-and-trade-plates"
+binding: vehicle
+binding_note: >-
+  The plate binds to the vehicle; the special/personalised COMBINATION binds to
+  an agreement holder. Transport SA, 2004, verbatim: "The plate may be
+  transferred to another vehicle registered in the same name as the agreement
+  holder, for an additional fee and at the discretion of the Registar [sic].
+  This agreement ceases if the vehicle owner sells the vehicles while the place
+  [sic] is allocated to that vehicle." The department's current pages still run
+  on the same idea — there is a "Renew number plate agreement" transaction.
+instrument:
+  citation: "Motor Vehicles Act 1959 (SA) and the Motor Vehicles Regulations 2010 (SA)"
+  access_note: >-
+    NOT READ IN THIS PASS. legislation.sa.gov.au returns HTTP 403 to every
+    non-browser client (Cloudflare managed challenge); direct fetch with full
+    browser header sets and an Internet Archive lookup both failed on
+    2026-08-02. NOT ONE WORD of South Australian legislation is quoted here,
+    and the display rules below are the department's restatement, not the
+    instrument. The verifier with a browser should read the Motor Vehicles
+    Regulations 2010 and re-audit this file — together with the NSW file, this
+    is the largest sourcing gap in the Australian wave.
+  licence: "SA.GOV.AU pages carry, verbatim: 'SA.GOV.AU is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Licence.' — CC BY 4.0, directly compatible with this dataset"
+
+national_schemes:
+  heavy_vehicle: >-
+    Heavy vehicles over 4.5 t GVM are registered under the Heavy Vehicle
+    National Law as applied in South Australia and carry a NATIONAL HEAVY
+    VEHICLE NUMBER PLATE issued by the State registrar on the national pattern.
+    Mechanism, not a series: the national serial grammar was not obtained
+    (recorded gap, L4). Three State instruments name the object in those words
+    — Qld reg 2021 s 117(2)(c), Tas reg 2021 reg 88(6), NT Motor Vehicles
+    Regulations 1977 reg 10.
+  light_vehicle_standards: >-
+    Australian Light Vehicle Standards Rules 2015 (national MODEL law,
+    Parliamentary Counsel's Committee, consolidated 22 March 2019) rule 86,
+    verbatim: "At least 1 number plate light must be fitted to the rear of a
+    vehicle." The Rules "do not, by themselves, have any legal effect" and
+    prescribe no plate dimension, colour or serial grammar.
+  ev_labels: "South Australia requires an approved safety label on electric, hybrid and hydrogen vehicles — the ALVSR Part 12 labelling family, fixed to the plate rather than a plate series. The department states it as a display rule (below)"
+  source: "https://www.pcc.gov.au/uniform/Australian%20Light%20Vehicle%20Standards%20Rules%202015%20-%2022%20March%202019.pdf  # ALVSR 2015 rule 86 and the model-law disclaimer, accessed 2026-08-02"
+
+display_rules:
+  integrity: "the department, verbatim: 'Number plates must show your registration number correctly. You cannot rearrange letters or numbers, or alter them so that they're hard to read.'"
+  plates_per_vehicle: "verbatim: plates must 'be displayed at the front and rear of the vehicle (unless it's a motorbike, trailer, caravan or special-purpose vehicle which only requires one number plate displayed at the rear)'"
+  visibility: "verbatim: plates must 'be clearly visible from the front and rear of the vehicle, so they can be read up to 20 metres away' and 'not be obscured by anything, including a tow ball, plastic cover, dirt buildup or any part of the vehicle's bodywork'"
+  lighting: "verbatim: 'at night, have the number plate on the rear of the vehicle lit with a white light, so it can be read from 20 metres away'"
+  ev_label: "verbatim: 'display an approved safety label if you drive an electric, hybrid or hydrogen powered vehicle'"
+  bike_rack: "verbatim: 'You must not display a standard number plate on both the rear of the vehicle and on a bicycle rack, or use homemade number plates.' Either a bicycle-rack plate goes on the rack, or the rear plate is moved to it — never both"
+  sources:
+    - "https://www.sa.gov.au/topics/driving-and-transport/registration/number-plates-and-trade-plates/displaying-number-plates  # SA.GOV.AU 'Displaying number plates', Department for Infrastructure and Transport, page last updated 8 May 2025 (read via the Internet Archive snapshot of 2025-08-05; the live host 403s to non-browser clients), accessed 2026-08-02"
+
+series:
+
+  # =========================================================================
+  # CURRENT GENERAL ISSUE.
+  # =========================================================================
+  - id: au-sa-standard
+    class: standard
+    categories: [car, van, truck, bus, motorcycle, trailer]
+    period: { start: 2008 }        # SECONDARY, AND CONTESTED — the locator
+                                   # says 2008, an independent enthusiast
+                                   # reference says 2009. Both recorded, not
+                                   # averaged (PRD-PLATES §5.3).
+    period_evidence: secondary-locator-unverified
+    matching: strict
+    format:
+      pattern: "L999 LLL"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z]\d{3} ?[A-Z]{3}\z'
+      regex_strict: '\AS\d{3} ?[A-Z]{3}\z'
+      evidence: secondary
+      charset:
+        notes: >-
+          Seven characters: a leading letter, three numerals, three letters,
+          printed as two groups. THE LEADING LETTER IS REPORTED TO BE A CONSTANT
+          'S' — for South Australia — across the whole series, which is why the
+          strict twin fixes it while `regex` leaves it a letter class. That
+          split is deliberate and is the §2.7 tier order doing its job: if the
+          'S' is really constant, `regex_strict` is the sourced grammar; if the
+          series later advances past S (as Tasmania's leading letter does, see
+          plates/au-tas.yml), `regex` still matches and nothing breaks. NO
+          DEPARTMENTAL SOURCE STATES EITHER FORM — this is the locator's shape,
+          flagged, and `format.evidence: secondary` says so.
+      progression: "ascending through the three-letter suffix behind a fixed numeric block; no departmental progression statement exists"
+    design:
+      colour_note: >-
+        Black characters on a reflective white ground. THE SOURCE IS TWENTY-TWO
+        YEARS OLD AND IS QUOTED AS SUCH — Transport SA, "Alpha-numeric plates
+        (general issue)", captured 6 December 2004, verbatim: "General issue
+        alpha-numeric plates have black characters on a reflective white
+        background / the slogan SA - The Festival State. The reflective
+        background makes the plates more visible at night." The colours have
+        carried forward on the evidence available; THE SLOGAN HAS NOT — "The
+        Festival State" is a former slogan and the current bottom legend is not
+        recorded here because no current departmental page states it (recorded
+        gap). No hexes: the department has never published values.
+      background: { color: "#FFFFFF", finish: retroreflective, hex_basis: observed }
+      plate: { w: 372, h: 134, unit: mm }
+      plate_dimension_note: "the cross-State Australian passenger size sourced in plates/au-wa.yml (WA DoT: 372 x 134 mm) and plates/au-nt.yml (NT MVR: 372 x 133 mm); the SA department publishes no millimetres (recorded gap)"
+      rear_differs: false
+    region_encoding: none
+    sources:
+      - "https://web.archive.org/web/20041206044325/http://www.transport.sa.gov.au/registrations/number_plates/alpha.asp  # Transport SA 'Alpha-numeric plates (general issue)', captured 6 December 2004 (accessed 2026-08-02): black characters on a reflective white background, the then slogan 'SA - The Festival State', the once-only fee and the transfer/agreement rule. The ONLY South Australian government page found that describes the general issue at all"
+      - "http://www.plateshack.com/y2k/South_Australia/southaustralia.htm  # enthusiast reference (PRD-PLATES §4 corroboration class), accessed 2026-08-02: a photo-dated plate captioned 'Current since 2009, South Australia license plate (June 2013)' and another captioned 'South Australia special graphics plate used up until 2008'. Corroborates a changeover in the 2008-2009 window and DISAGREES with the locator on the year"
+      - "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_South_Australia  # LOCATOR ONLY (PRD-PLATES §4), accessed 2026-08-02: the S-prefixed seven-character arrangement and a 2008 changeover. Uncited in the article; used as a finding aid and flagged"
+    notes: >-
+      SOUTH AUSTRALIA'S CURRENT GENERAL ISSUE, WITH ITS START YEAR IN DISPUTE
+      AND THE DISPUTE RECORDED RATHER THAN SPLIT. The locator says the previous
+      series ran to 2008; an independent enthusiast reference captions a
+      photo-dated plate "Current since 2009". PRD-PLATES §5.3 forbids averaging
+      disagreements, so the value carried is the locator's 2008 and this note
+      states the competing 2009 claim in terms. Either way the changeover sits
+      in a two-year window and neither source is the department. THE FORMAT IS
+      EQUALLY SECONDARY: no South Australian government page — current or
+      archived — states the general-issue combination, which is why
+      `format.evidence: secondary` sits beside a `regex_strict` that is a
+      HYPOTHESIS about the constant 'S' rather than a sourced alphabet. THE ID
+      IS UNDATED, for the us-fl-standard reason. What a verifier should chase,
+      in order: the Motor Vehicles Regulations 2010 (SA); a Registrar's notice
+      in the South Australian Government Gazette; and the department's own
+      historical pages, of which the 2004 capture proves at least one good one
+      once existed.
+
+  # =========================================================================
+  # ONE SERIES BACK.
+  # =========================================================================
+  - id: au-sa-standard-3l3n
+    class: standard
+    categories: [car, van, truck, bus, motorcycle, trailer]
+    period: { start: 1967, end: 2008 }
+    period_evidence: secondary-locator-unverified
+    matching: strict
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLL 999"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z]{3} ?\d{3}\z'
+      evidence: secondary
+      charset: { notes: "three letters then three numerals — the shape every Australian State ran under the 1948 letter allocation described in plates/au-act.yml. South Australia's own block of that allocation is not published" }
+    design:
+      colour_note: "black characters on a reflective white ground with the slogan 'SA - The Festival State' for the later part of the run — Transport SA's own 2004 words, which describe THIS series, since the capture predates the changeover"
+      plate: { w: 372, h: 134, unit: mm }
+    region_encoding: none
+    sources:
+      - "https://web.archive.org/web/20041206044325/http://www.transport.sa.gov.au/registrations/number_plates/alpha.asp  # Transport SA, 6 December 2004: the general issue AS IT THEN STOOD — black on reflective white, 'SA - The Festival State'. Because the capture predates the changeover, this is a contemporaneous departmental description of THIS series, which is stronger evidence than the successor series enjoys"
+      - "http://www.plateshack.com/y2k/South_Australia/southaustralia.htm  # enthusiast reference, accessed 2026-08-02: a plate captioned '1967 to 1981 style South Australia general series license plate' — independent corroboration for the 1967 boundary the locator gives"
+      - "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_South_Australia  # LOCATOR ONLY: the 1967-2008 window and the three-letter/three-numeral arrangement. Flagged, not asserted"
+    notes: >-
+      THE PREVIOUS SOUTH AUSTRALIAN GENERAL ISSUE. Both boundaries are the
+      locator's, but each has one independent corroboration: an enthusiast
+      reference dates a "1967 to 1981 style" general series plate, and the same
+      reference's "used up until 2008" caption brackets the far end. The
+      strongest single piece of evidence attaching to this series is the
+      contemporaneous Transport SA page of 2004, which describes it as the
+      current general issue in the department's own words — the successor series
+      has no equivalent. That inversion (the DEAD series better sourced than the
+      LIVE one) is worth naming: it is what happens when an agency stops
+      publishing plate information and the only good pages survive in an archive.
+
+  # =========================================================================
+  # PERSONALISED / SPECIAL — the one published South Australian constraint.
+  # =========================================================================
+  - id: au-sa-special
+    class: personalized
+    categories: [car, van, truck, motorcycle, trailer]
+    period: { start: 2008 }        # UPPER BOUND: the earliest evidence read
+                                   # for the CURRENT operation, not a start.
+    period_evidence: instrument-in-force-upper-bound
+    matching: strict
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLLLLLL"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z0-9]{1,7}\z'
+      evidence: authority
+      charset:
+        notes: >-
+          EzyPlates — the South Australian Government's own plate-ordering
+          service, on the sa.gov.au domain — states the constraint for custom
+          plates verbatim: "Custom plates - letters only, or letters and
+          numbers, a combination of 1 to 7 characters." That is a real,
+          published, government-stated bound on a South Australian serial, and
+          it is the ONLY one obtained anywhere in the Australian wave. Seven is
+          also exactly the width of the general issue, which is a consistent
+          picture rather than a coincidence. `matching: strict` is earned: the
+          regex is the authority's own stated frame, not a catch-all.
+      note: "the service also offers numeric, historical, R&S-series, Japanese-style, Euro-style, premium and corporate ranges; those are DESIGN catalogues on the same serial frame and are out of scope at this gate (PRD-PLATES §2.5)"
+    design:
+      note: "one design per range; individual personalised designs are L4 scope"
+    programme:
+      operator: "EzyPlates, on the South Australian Government domain ezyplates.sa.gov.au"
+      why_it_matters: >-
+        A government-domain operator makes the published serial constraint an
+        AUTHORITY statement rather than a vendor's copy. Contrast Queensland,
+        where the same function sits on a commercial domain that the regulation
+        itself names (au-qld.yml, reg 2021 s 132(7)), and New South Wales, where
+        it sits on a commercial domain the agency merely links to.
+    region_encoding: none
+    sources:
+      - "https://ezyplates.sa.gov.au/  # EzyPlates (Department for Infrastructure and Transport), read via the Internet Archive because the live host 403s to non-browser clients, accessed 2026-08-02: 'Custom plates - letters only, or letters and numbers, a combination of 1 to 7 characters'; the range catalogue (custom, personalised, premium, Euro, Japanese, numeric, historical, R&S series, corporate, Koala State, standard, bike rack)"
+      - "https://www.sa.gov.au/topics/driving-and-transport/registration/number-plates-and-trade-plates/order-special-number-plates  # SA.GOV.AU 'Order special number plates' — the departmental entry point for the same programme (accessed 2026-08-02)"
+    notes: >-
+      SOUTH AUSTRALIAN SPECIAL (PERSONALISED) PLATES. Recorded as its own series
+      because the SERIAL SOURCE differs — owner-chosen rather than
+      registrar-assigned — and because it carries the only government-published
+      serial bound in the file. `period.start: 2008` IS AN UPPER BOUND AND
+      MEANS ONLY "the programme was running by then": South Australia has sold
+      special plates for decades (the archived 2004 Transport SA pages already
+      describe slogan and historic plate products), and no start date was
+      obtained. Labelled `instrument-in-force-upper-bound` rather than dressed
+      up. CLASS CAVEAT: recorded as `personalized`; the department's own word is
+      "special", which in South Australia covers both owner-chosen combinations
+      and departmental design ranges — a vocabulary mismatch worth knowing
+      about, not worth a new class.
+gaps:
+  - "The Motor Vehicles Regulations 2010 (SA) were not read (legislation.sa.gov.au 403s to machine clients) — no South Australian instrument is quoted anywhere in this file"
+  - "The CURRENT bottom legend/slogan of the general issue: no current departmental page states it; the 2004 capture's 'SA - The Festival State' is a FORMER slogan and is recorded as such"
+  - "The 2008 vs 2009 changeover disagreement is recorded, not resolved"
+  - "Trade plates exist as a named departmental product with their own pages and are NOT authored — no format is published"