vehicles 0.6.1 → 0.8.0

data/data/plates/us-va.yml

@@ -0,0 +1,567 @@
+# plates/us-va.yml — Virginia (PRD-PLATES gate L2, group southeast-a).
+#
+# THE VIRGINIA FINDING, stated first because it governs every other claim in
+# this file: VIRGINIA'S PLATE STATUTE SPECIFIES ALMOST NOTHING. § 46.2-712(A)
+# of the Code of Virginia says, verbatim, "Subject to the need for legibility,
+# the size of the plate, the letters, numerals, and decals thereon, and the
+# color of the plate, letters, numerals, and decals shall be in the discretion
+# of the Commissioner." Compare Florida, whose § 320.06(3)(a) fixes a minimum
+# size, a seven-character cap and five mandatory bottom legends. Virginia's
+# legislature delegated the entire design to an administrator and wrote down
+# only what the plate must CARRY (registration number, state name, year or
+# month-and-year). Consequence for this dataset: no Virginia format claim can
+# ever be "statutory", because there is no statutory format. Formats here are
+# graded honestly with `period_evidence` and `format_evidence`, and the
+# serial arrangements come from a LOCATOR, not a primary.
+#
+# EVIDENCE GRADES USED IN THIS FILE (and across group southeast-a):
+#   statutory-date                  a date stated in the statute itself
+#   official-agency-date            a date stated by the issuing agency
+#   instrument-in-force-upper-bound the edition of the instrument read; an
+#                                   UPPER BOUND on the true start
+#   secondary-locator-unverified    the year is reported ONLY by Wikipedia or
+#                                   a collector reference. Recorded WITH its
+#                                   grade attached, asserted as nothing more.
+#                                   This is labelling, not laundering: the
+#                                   PRD forbids passing collector era tables
+#                                   off as sourced years, and every such year
+#                                   in this file is marked at the point of use.
+#
+# SOURCING PATH NOTE: every Code of Virginia section below was fetched from
+# law.lis.virginia.gov (the Division of Legislative Automated Systems' own
+# service), section pages stamped 8/1/2026. Edicts of government are public
+# domain at every level, so the statute is preferred over the DMV brochure
+# wherever both speak — which, in Virginia, is almost nowhere.
+jurisdiction: us-va
+authority:
+  name: Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV)
+  url: "https://www.dmv.virginia.gov/vehicles/license-plates"
+binding: vehicle
+statute_edition: "Code of Virginia, Title 46.2 (Motor Vehicles), Chapter 6 (Titling and Registration), Articles 9-11 and Chapter 15 — section pages as served by law.lis.virginia.gov and stamped 8/1/2026"
+
+# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
+# artwork_risk — required per jurisdiction by PRD-PLATES §4.
+# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
+artwork_risk:
+  posture: no-public-domain-basis-located
+  basis: >-
+    VIRGINIA IS A NEGATIVE RESULT, RECORDED AS ONE. The federal 17 U.S.C. §105
+    public-domain rule does not reach the states, so the default for a state
+    plate design is COPYRIGHTED unless that state says otherwise, and no
+    Virginia instrument saying otherwise was located in this pass. Three
+    pieces of evidence, all fetched: (1) Virginia does not appear at all in
+    the per-state survey of subnational copyright postures that carries
+    Florida, California, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, New Jersey,
+    Massachusetts, New York, Arizona, Pennsylvania and Washington — it is not
+    listed as favourable OR adverse, it is simply absent; (2) Wikimedia
+    Commons has no {{PD-VAGov}} template (HTTP 404), where it does have
+    PD-FLGov, PD-CAGov, PD-GAGov, PD-MAGov, PD-MEGov and PD-PRGov, and its
+    US rules page states the default flatly as "Other states: copyrighted";
+    (3) both Virginia sites read for this file carry all-rights-reserved
+    notices in their own footers — the DMV's ("©2026 Virginia Department of
+    Motor Vehicles. All Rights Reserved.") and the Virginia Law service's
+    ("© Copyright Commonwealth of Virginia. All rights reserved."). None of
+    those three is a copyright assertion over a PLATE DESIGN; together they
+    are enough to say Virginia has no established public-domain posture and
+    must be treated as default-copyrighted.
+  edict_carve_out: >-
+    The Code of Virginia itself is an edict of government and is public
+    domain at every level regardless of the footer notice on the site that
+    serves it. Everything this file cites to § 46.2-711 through § 46.2-750 is
+    therefore freely usable even under the adverse default — which is exactly
+    why PRD-PLATES §4 makes the statute the preferred source. The problem in
+    Virginia is not that the statute is unusable; it is that the statute says
+    so little (see the header).
+  emblem_rule: >-
+    PRD-PLATES §3's placeholder default applies without qualification: render
+    `emblem: {present: true, rendered: placeholder}`. The "VIRGINIA IS FOR
+    LOVERS" wordmark on the current base is a registered tourism brand of the
+    Commonwealth used far beyond plates, which is a TRADEMARK question on top
+    of the copyright one and is unresearched. The red heart glyph that
+    substitutes for the second V is part of that mark. Do not reproduce
+    either; render the slogan slot as a neutral placeholder.
+  photograph_caution: >-
+    Commons photographs of Virginia plates carry the PHOTOGRAPHER's licence
+    on the PHOTOGRAPH; the uploader had no standing over the design. Because
+    our renders are generated from data and never derived from a photograph,
+    those obligations never attach. Same reasoning as us-fl.
+  sources:
+    - "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_status_of_works_by_subnational_governments_of_the_United_States  # LOCATOR: the per-state survey in which Virginia does NOT appear — the negative result itself"
+    - "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Copyright_rules_by_territory/United_States  # 'Federal, California, Florida, Georgia, Massachusetts, Puerto Rico: public domain / Other states: copyrighted' — the default Virginia falls under"
+    - "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Template:PD-VAGov  # HTTP 404 — no Virginia public-domain tag exists on Commons (checked 2026-08-01)"
+    - "https://www.dmv.virginia.gov/vehicles/license-plates  # DMV site footer: '©2026 Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles. All Rights Reserved.'"
+    - "https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title46.2/chapter6/section46.2-712/  # Virginia Law site footer: '© Copyright Commonwealth of Virginia. All rights reserved.' — asserted over the service, not over the edict it serves"
+
+# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
+# The US standards chain, recorded once per state file. Voluntary, no federal
+# mandate, and the dimension authority is SAE J686, whose own text is
+# PAYWALLED and UNPINNED — nothing in this file quotes J686.
+# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
+us_standards:
+  no_federal_mandate: true
+  chain: "SAE J686 -> AAMVA License Plate Standard Edition 3 (September 2025) -> voluntary state adoption. AAMVA writes recommendations in the declarative present; read as RECOMMENDED PRACTICE, never as requirement."
+  aamva_edition_3:
+    dimensions_delegated: "AAMVA §3.1 sends dimensions and bolt holes to SAE J686. J686's own text was NOT obtained (paywalled); no J686 dimension is quoted anywhere in this dataset."
+    character_layout: "AAMVA §2.2: characters at least 2.5 in high, spaced at least 0.25 in apart, stroke weight 0.2-0.4 in, at least 1.25 in clear of top and bottom edges"
+    jurisdiction_name_layout: "AAMVA §2.1: jurisdiction name in the top centre between the bolt holes, at least 0.25 in above the plate number and 0.125 in from the top edge; jurisdiction characters 0.75-1.0 in"
+    stacked_characters: "AAMVA: stacked characters are part of the official plate number; no more than two stacked. Consequential for normalisation."
+    replacement_cycle: "AAMVA §1.1 recommends a rolling or full replacement cycle not to exceed 7 to 10 years. VIRGINIA LEGISLATES NO REPLACEMENT CYCLE AT ALL — a genuine contrast with South Carolina (10 years in statute) and Florida (10 years in statute), and a real fact about Virginia rather than a gap."
+    source: "https://www.aamva.org/getmedia/646bcc8a-219b-47d8-b5cd-726240473163/License-Plate-Standard-Edition-3_September-2025-Update.pdf"
+  folklore_caution: >-
+    THE 1956 STORY HAS MOVED, AND THE MOVE IS WORTH RECORDING. The US-world
+    dossier found the "1956 AMA standardization agreement" carrying a
+    `citation needed` since 2017 and copied verbatim across articles. As of
+    this pass the Virginia, West Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and
+    Georgia articles all still repeat it, but it now cites a single collector
+    -magazine article — Christopher Garrish, "Reconsidering the Standard
+    Plate Size", Plates (ALPCA), vol. 62 no. 5, October 2016. That is a
+    reference, not a primary, it was NOT obtained (ALPCA's members' magazine
+    is not online), and its own title announces that it RECONSIDERS the
+    received story. Status is therefore unchanged for our purposes:
+    COMMONLY REPEATED, NOT PRIMARY-SOURCED. Virginia's own 6x12 dimension is
+    NOT in the Code of Virginia at all (§ 46.2-712(A) leaves size to the
+    Commissioner), so this file makes no Virginia dimension claim.
+
+# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
+# Display rules. Virginia is a TWO-PLATE state with the same truck-tractor
+# inversion Florida has — and it is worth noticing that two states which
+# share nothing else share that one odd rule.
+# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
+display_rules:
+  default: "TWO plates, front and rear. § 46.2-711(A): 'The Department shall furnish one license plate for every registered moped, motorcycle, autocycle, tractor truck, semitrailer, or trailer, and two license plates for every other registered motor vehicle, except to licensed motor vehicle dealers and persons delivering unladen vehicles who shall be furnished one license plate.'"
+  one_plate_classes: "moped, motorcycle, autocycle, tractor truck, semitrailer, trailer, dealers, transporters of unladen vehicles (§ 46.2-711(A))"
+  rear_only: "moped, motorcycle, autocycle, trailer, semitrailer, dealer and transporter plates (§ 46.2-715)"
+  front_only: "TRACTOR TRUCK: '.. The license plate assigned to a tractor truck shall be attached to the front of the vehicle.' (§ 46.2-715) — front-only, the inverse of the state default, and the same outlier Florida legislates in § 320.0706. Two unrelated states, one rule: a classifier keyed on 'plate seen at front therefore commercial' is right in both."
+  mounting: "§ 46.2-716(A): securely fastened so as to prevent swinging, in a position to be clearly visible, and in a condition to be clearly legible"
+  obstruction: "§ 46.2-716(B): no colored glass, plastic, bracket, holder, mounting, frame or other covering may alter or obscure (i) the alpha-numeric information, (ii) THE COLOR OF THE PLATE, (iii) the state name or abbreviation, or (iv) any character, decal or stamp indicating the expiry month or year. Note (ii): Virginia legislates that the plate's COLOUR is legally significant information even though § 46.2-712 refuses to say what that colour is."
+  mail_carrier_exception: "§ 46.2-711(F): the display requirement does not apply to vehicles collecting and delivering US mail to the extent the rear plate is covered by the 'CAUTION, FREQUENT STOPS, U.S. MAIL' sign while so engaged"
+  penalty_relief: "§§ 46.2-711(G), 46.2-715, 46.2-716(D): for any summons issued, the court may in its discretion dismiss it where proof of compliance is provided on or before the court date"
+  sources:
+    - "https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title46.2/chapter6/section46.2-711/  # § 46.2-711(A) one-vs-two plates and the classes that get one; (B)-(E) the designated-plate classes; (F) display required + the US-mail exception; (G) dismissal on proof"
+    - "https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title46.2/chapter6/section46.2-715/  # § 46.2-715: front and rear default, rear-only classes, TRACTOR TRUCK FRONT ONLY, one plate for dealers and transporters"
+    - "https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title46.2/chapter6/section46.2-716/  # § 46.2-716(A) fastening; (B) the covering/obscuring rule including plate COLOUR; (C) Superintendent's mounting regulations"
+
+series:
+
+  # =========================================================================
+  # CURRENT STANDARD ISSUE.
+  # =========================================================================
+  - id: us-va-standard-lovers
+    class: standard
+    categories: [car, van, truck, bus]
+    period: { start: 2014 }
+    period_evidence: secondary-locator-unverified
+    matching: strict
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLL-9999"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z]{3}-?\d{4}\z'
+      format_evidence: secondary-locator-unverified
+      charset:
+        notes: >-
+          NO CHARSET RESTRICTION IS SOURCED FOR THIS BASE. § 46.2-712(A) states
+          no alphabet, no length and no exclusions — it delegates all three to
+          the Commissioner. The only Virginia letter-exclusion fact located
+          anywhere is HISTORICAL and points the other way: on the 1979-1992
+          base, serials with I, O or Q were withheld and then RELEASED, first
+          (from 1988) with those letters in the first position and finally
+          (from 1990) in the second and third, ending at ZZQ-999. So Virginia
+          demonstrably does issue I, O and Q. No `regex_strict` is given
+          because there is nothing sourced to tighten.
+      progression: >-
+          Reported serial progression on this base: forward through the 'V'
+          series from VAA-1001 to VZZ-9950, then BACKWARDS from UZZ-9950
+          through the 'U', 'T' and now 'S' series. Backwards progression is
+          not a mistake in the record — Virginia has run serials in reverse
+          before, on the 1993 base, reportedly to avoid colliding with an
+          optional plate progressing forwards. LOCATOR-GRADE, not asserted.
+      separator_note: >-
+          The hyphen is written because the plate prints one. `-?` makes it
+          optional so a separator-stripping consumer's canonical form still
+          matches without deriving a twin (PRD-PLATES §2.6 rule 2 keeps the
+          PRINTED form here; the optionality is a convenience, not a claim
+          that Virginia sometimes omits the hyphen).
+    design:
+      plate: { w: 12, h: 6, unit: in, dimension_evidence: convention-not-sourced }
+      plate_dimension_note: >-
+          NO VIRGINIA DIMENSION IS SOURCED. § 46.2-712(A) puts plate size in
+          the Commissioner's discretion and no departmental specification was
+          obtained. 12 x 6 in is recorded as the North American CONVENTION
+          (AAMVA -> SAE J686, voluntary) and explicitly not as a Virginia
+          claim. Contrast South Carolina and Georgia, both of which legislate
+          the minima.
+      background: { color: "#FFFFFF", finish: retroreflective, hex_basis: observed }
+      foreground: "#1F3D7A"
+      colour_note: >-
+          NEITHER COLOUR IS IN THE CODE. § 46.2-712(A) leaves plate, letter and
+          numeral colour to the Commissioner — and then § 46.2-716(B) makes it
+          an offence to obscure that unspecified colour, which is a nice piece
+          of statutory drafting. The reflective-white ground with an embossed
+          dark-blue serial is `hex_basis: observed`, from a locator
+          description only. Both hexes are approximations and must not be
+          treated as sourced values.
+      legend_top: "VIRGINIA"
+      legend_bottom: "VIRGINIA IS FOR LOVERS"
+      legend_note: >-
+          The slogan is screened at the bottom in black with a red heart
+          substituting for the second 'V'. It is a Commonwealth tourism mark
+          used far beyond plates — see artwork_risk.emblem_rule. Statutorily
+          the plate need only carry the registration number, the name of the
+          Commonwealth (which may be abbreviated) and the year or month-and-
+          year (§ 46.2-712(A)); the slogan is Commissioner's discretion.
+      emblem: { present: true, rendered: placeholder }
+      band: { side: none }
+      rear_differs: false
+      validation: "month-and-year decals, placed as the Commissioner prescribes, indicating the month and year of expiration; on issuance a new registration card is issued with the same expiry date (§ 46.2-712(A))"
+    replacement_cycle:
+      years: null
+      note: >-
+          VIRGINIA LEGISLATES NO REPLACEMENT CYCLE. Nothing in §§ 46.2-711 to
+          46.2-716 mandates periodic replacement, and § 46.2-714 goes the
+          other way, authorising PERMANENT plates at the Department's
+          discretion. This is a real state-level fact, not a gap: the answer
+          to "how often does Virginia reissue?" is "the statute does not say,
+          and it expressly contemplates plates that are never replaced."
+    region_encoding: none
+    sources:
+      - "https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title46.2/chapter6/section46.2-712/  # § 46.2-712(A): what the plate must display (registration number, name of the Commonwealth, year or month-and-year); the discretion clause that leaves size, letters, numerals and ALL colour to the Commissioner; the decal rule"
+      - "https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title46.2/chapter6/section46.2-711/  # § 46.2-711(A): two plates for this class of vehicle"
+      - "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Virginia  # LOCATOR ONLY (PRD-PLATES §4): the March 2014 start, the ABC-1234 arrangement, the VIRGINIA IS FOR LOVERS slogan and heart, the V/U/T/S serial blocks and the reverse progression. None of it is asserted as sourced."
+    notes: >-
+      VIRGINIA CURRENT STANDARD ISSUE. THE PERIOD AND THE FORMAT ARE BOTH
+      LOCATOR-GRADE AND SAID SO. Virginia is the clearest case in this group of
+      a state whose plate facts simply are not in its law: the Code fixes the
+      CONTENTS of a plate and hands everything else — size, colours, serial
+      arrangement, replacement, slogan — to the Commissioner, and the
+      Commissioner does not publish a specification. So the honest record is a
+      fully sourced statutory frame wrapped around a locator-grade serial
+      arrangement, with the grades attached at every claim rather than blended
+      into one confident-looking row. A Virginia Administrative Code search for
+      a DMV plate specification returned nothing usable in this pass and is the
+      single highest-value follow-up for this state (recorded gap).
+
+  # =========================================================================
+  # ONE SERIES BACK — the immediately preceding standard base.
+  # =========================================================================
+  - id: us-va-standard-plain-2008
+    class: standard
+    categories: [car, van, truck, bus]
+    period: { start: 2008, end: 2014 }
+    period_evidence: secondary-locator-unverified
+    matching: strict
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLL-9999"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z]{3}-?\d{4}\z'
+      format_evidence: secondary-locator-unverified
+      progression: "reported as running BACKWARDS from XXP-9999 towards approximately WLN-1001, with the 'R' series reserved for rental vehicles — the same rental reservation Virginia is reported to have run from the 1973 base until the late 1990s. Locator-grade."
+    design:
+      plate: { w: 12, h: 6, unit: in, dimension_evidence: convention-not-sourced }
+      background: { color: "#FFFFFF", finish: retroreflective, hex_basis: observed }
+      foreground: "#1F3D7A"
+      legend_top: "VIRGINIA"
+      legend_bottom: null
+      legend_note: "SLOGAN-FREE. This base is reported as a return to the 1993 design: embossed dark blue serial on reflective white, 'VIRGINIA' screened in blue at the top, and nothing at the bottom. The design difference from the current base is exactly one slogan, which under PRD-PLATES §2.3 (own series iff format OR design OR period differs) makes it its own series."
+      emblem: { present: false }
+      rear_differs: false
+    region_encoding: none
+    sources:
+      - "https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title46.2/chapter6/section46.2-712/  # § 46.2-712(A): the same statutory frame governed this base — Virginia's plate law did not change across the boundary, only the Commissioner's design did"
+      - "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Virginia  # LOCATOR ONLY: January 2008 - February 2014, the return to the 1993 base, ABC-1234, the backwards progression and the 'R' rental reservation"
+    notes: >-
+      THE PREVIOUS VIRGINIA STANDARD BASE, AND THE REASON THE BOUNDARY IS SOFT.
+      Nothing in Virginia law marks this transition — no effective date, no
+      instrument, no departmental notice was located. The 2014 boundary is a
+      LOCATOR claim on both sides, which is why both this series and its
+      successor carry `secondary-locator-unverified` rather than a date grade.
+      The 2014 overlap year is deliberate and is the honest shape of a rollout:
+      old stock issues on. Verifiers should treat both endpoints as soft and
+      should not "tighten" them without a Virginia primary.
+
+  # =========================================================================
+  # CORE CLASSES. Virginia issues these as separately designated plates by
+  # statute (§ 46.2-711(B)-(E), § 46.2-750, § 46.2-1546), but publishes no
+  # serial specification for any of them — so each is recall-only with the
+  # statutory facts carried and the format recorded as a gap.
+  # =========================================================================
+  - id: us-va-motorcycle
+    class: motorcycle
+    categories: [motorcycle, moped]
+    period: { start: 2026 }
+    period_evidence: instrument-in-force-upper-bound
+    matching: recall-only
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLLLLLL"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z0-9](?: ?[A-Z0-9]){0,6}\z'
+      charset:
+        notes: >-
+          DELIBERATELY OVER-BROAD, HENCE `recall-only`. A match here says only
+          "this string has a shape Virginia could have issued", never "this is
+          a valid Virginia motorcycle registration". The seven-character bound
+          is a DATASET-CHOSEN recall bound following the North American
+          convention; VIRGINIA LAW STATES NO LENGTH CAP — § 46.2-712(A) leaves
+          the letters and numerals entirely to the Commissioner. The bound is
+          therefore explicitly not a legal claim. Contrast Florida, whose
+          § 320.06(3)(a) really does cap at seven and can be cited for it.
+    design:
+      plate: { unit: in, dimension_note: "reduced-size motorcycle plate; no Virginia dimension is sourced (§ 46.2-712(A) leaves size to the Commissioner)" }
+      background: { finish: retroreflective }
+      emblem: { present: true, rendered: placeholder }
+    display: "ONE plate, attached to the REAR (§§ 46.2-711(A), 46.2-715)"
+    region_encoding: none
+    sources:
+      - "https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title46.2/chapter6/section46.2-711/  # § 46.2-711(A): one plate for every registered moped, motorcycle or autocycle"
+      - "https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title46.2/chapter6/section46.2-715/  # § 46.2-715: the moped/motorcycle/autocycle plate is attached to the rear"
+    notes: >-
+      VIRGINIA MOTORCYCLE AND MOPED. Modelled as its own series because
+      Virginia issues ONE plate here against two for the standard class — a
+      statutory difference, not a design preference. AUTOCYCLES RIDE WITH THE
+      MOTORCYCLES in Virginia law (§§ 46.2-711(A), 46.2-715 name them in the
+      same breath), which is a live modelling question for a dataset whose
+      `categories` vocabulary has no autocycle value; recorded here rather than
+      forced. The serial arrangement is a recorded gap.
+
+  - id: us-va-trailer
+    class: trailer
+    categories: [trailer]
+    period: { start: 2026 }
+    period_evidence: instrument-in-force-upper-bound
+    matching: recall-only
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLLLLLL"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z0-9](?: ?[A-Z0-9]){0,6}\z'
+      charset: { notes: "recall-only for the same reason as us-va-motorcycle: Virginia publishes no trailer serial specification and § 46.2-712(A) imposes no alphabet or length" }
+    design:
+      plate: { unit: in }
+      background: { finish: retroreflective }
+      anti_removal_note: "§ 46.2-711(A), verbatim: 'The license plates for trailers, semitrailers, commercial vehicles, and trucks, other than license plates for dealers, may be of such design as to prevent removal without mutilating some part of the indicia forming a part of the license plate, when secured to the bracket.' A statutory ANTI-THEFT design authorisation — Virginia legislates that these plates may be built to destroy themselves on removal. Nothing comparable was found in the other four states of this group."
+    permanent_registration: "§ 46.2-712(B): the Department MAY issue permanent plates without decals and without a month and year of expiration for all trailers and semitrailers regardless of weight; also for trucks and tractor trucks over 26,000 lb GVWR/GCWR, taxicabs and taxicab-service vehicles, common carriers for hire, business-use trucks between 7,501 and 26,000 lb, and farm vehicles registered under § 46.2-698"
+    display: "ONE plate, attached to the REAR (§§ 46.2-711(A), 46.2-715)"
+    region_encoding: none
+    sources:
+      - "https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title46.2/chapter6/section46.2-711/  # § 46.2-711(A): one plate for trailers and semitrailers; the anti-removal design authorisation; (B)(7) trailers and semitrailers as an appropriately designated class"
+      - "https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title46.2/chapter6/section46.2-712/  # § 46.2-712(B): permanent, decal-free, expiry-free plates for trailers and semitrailers regardless of weight, and the other permanent classes"
+    notes: >-
+      VIRGINIA TRAILER AND SEMITRAILER. The interesting content is not the
+      serial — which is unsourced — but two statutory design facts that most
+      plate datasets never model: the anti-removal construction authorisation
+      in § 46.2-711(A), and the PERMANENT, decal-free, expiry-free plate in
+      § 46.2-712(B). The second one breaks a common consumer assumption that
+      every US plate carries a visible expiry; in Virginia an entire class
+      lawfully does not.
+
+  - id: us-va-dealer
+    class: dealer
+    categories: [car, van, truck, bus, motorcycle, trailer]
+    period: { start: 2026 }
+    period_evidence: instrument-in-force-upper-bound
+    matching: recall-only
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLLLLLL"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z0-9](?: ?[A-Z0-9]){0,6}\z'
+      charset: { notes: "recall-only; no dealer serial specification is published and § 46.2-712(A) imposes none" }
+    design:
+      plate: { unit: in }
+      background: { finish: retroreflective }
+      emblem: { present: true, rendered: placeholder }
+    binding: business
+    eligibility_and_quota: >-
+      § 46.2-1546: every manufacturer, distributor or dealer must apply for a
+      dealer's certificate of vehicle registration and license plates before
+      operating inventory vehicles. The plate count is rationed by sales
+      volume: fewer than 25 vehicles sold in the last 12 months of the
+      preceding licence year -> no more than TWO plates; at least 25 but fewer
+      than 50 -> no more than FOUR; 50 or more sold during the current licence
+      year -> may apply for additional plates not exceeding four times the
+      number of licensed salespersons employed.
+    display: "ONE plate per set, attached to the REAR (§§ 46.2-711(A), 46.2-715)"
+    region_encoding: none
+    sources:
+      - "https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title46.2/chapter15/section46.2-1546/  # § 46.2-1546: dealer registration and plates, the definition of a vehicle 'in inventory', staggered issue, and the sales-volume plate quota"
+      - "https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title46.2/chapter6/section46.2-711/  # § 46.2-711(A): dealers and transporters are furnished ONE plate, not two"
+      - "https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title46.2/chapter6/section46.2-715/  # § 46.2-715: dealer plates consist of one plate per set, attached to the rear"
+    notes: >-
+      VIRGINIA DEALER PLATES. `binding: business` for the same reason as
+      Germany's rote Kennzeichen and us-fl-dealer: the plate follows the
+      dealership, not a vehicle. The quota rule in § 46.2-1546 is worth
+      carrying because it is a real constraint on the SIZE of this series —
+      a state where dealer plates are rationed by sales volume has a bounded
+      dealer serial space, which is a fact a parse API can use. Virginia also
+      runs a separate TRANSPORTER plate for persons delivering unladen
+      vehicles (§ 46.2-733), which shares the one-plate/rear treatment; it is
+      not given its own entry because no primary for its format was obtained.
+
+  - id: us-va-government
+    class: government
+    categories: [car, van, truck, bus]
+    period: { start: 2026 }
+    period_evidence: instrument-in-force-upper-bound
+    matching: recall-only
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLLLLLL"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z0-9](?: ?[A-Z0-9]){0,6}\z'
+      charset:
+        notes: >-
+          recall-only. § 46.2-750 does state that "The Commissioner shall
+          reserve a unique series of numbers for use on" state vehicles — so
+          Virginia government plates ARE separately serialized as a matter of
+          law — but the reserved series itself is not published and was not
+          obtained. That is the gap: the EXISTENCE of a distinct series is
+          sourced; its shape is not.
+    design:
+      plate: { unit: in }
+      background: { finish: retroreflective }
+      legend_rule: >-
+          § 46.2-750(A): plates for vehicles owned by the Commonwealth "shall
+          have conspicuously and legibly inscribed, stamped, or printed
+          thereon words stating that the vehicle is for official state use
+          only", EXCEPT plates used on vehicles (i) devoted solely to police
+          work, (ii) used by the Virginia Economic Development Partnership to
+          the extent approved by the Governor, (iii) used by an institution of
+          higher education solely for vehicle technology research, or (iv)
+          used by the Governor and the Attorney General.
+      emblem: { present: true, rendered: placeholder }
+    eligibility: "motor vehicles, trailers and semitrailers owned by the Commonwealth, by political subdivisions of the Commonwealth, and by regional jail authorities created under Article 3.1 (§ 53.1-95.2 et seq.) of Chapter 3 of Title 53.1, and used SOLELY for governmental purposes (§ 46.2-750(A))"
+    fee: "equal to the Department's cost of purchasing or manufacturing the plates; receipts go to a special fund for Department expenses (§ 46.2-750(A))"
+    region_encoding: none
+    sources:
+      - "https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title46.2/chapter6/section46.2-750/  # § 46.2-750(A): eligibility, the cost-only fee, the 'official state use only' legend, the four exceptions to it, and the Commissioner's duty to reserve a unique series of numbers"
+    notes: >-
+      VIRGINIA GOVERNMENT PLATES, AND THE FOUR CARVE-OUTS THAT MATTER TO A
+      CLASSIFIER. The rule is not "state vehicles are marked" — it is "state
+      vehicles are marked UNLESS they are police, economic-development,
+      university research, or the Governor's and Attorney General's cars." A
+      consumer inferring "unmarked therefore private" in Virginia is wrong in
+      four legislated ways, and the police carve-out is the one that will
+      matter most. § 46.2-750.1 (vehicles used for police work) and § 46.2-751
+      (state-owned passenger vehicles) sit alongside and were not read in this
+      pass (recorded gap).
+
+  # =========================================================================
+  # PERSONALIZED. Virginia officially permits a glyph inside the serial —
+  # a PRD-PLATES §2.6 schema-amendment candidate, not a data entry.
+  # =========================================================================
+  - id: us-va-personalized
+    class: personalized
+    categories: [car, van, truck, bus, motorcycle, trailer]
+    period: { start: 2026 }
+    period_evidence: instrument-in-force-upper-bound
+    matching: strict
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLLLLLL"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z0-9](?: ?[A-Z0-9]){0,6}\z'
+      charset:
+        notes: >-
+          THE AMPERSAND PROBLEM — READ THIS BEFORE TRUSTING THE REGEX. Virginia
+          DMV states, in its own words: "Use any combination of letters,
+          numbers and the special characters DASH, SPACE AND AMPERSAND." Dash
+          and space are emitted separators and are already in the contract.
+          THE AMPERSAND IS NOT: it is not in the serial alphabet, it is not a
+          separator, and under PRD-PLATES §2.6 a jurisdiction that prints a
+          glyph INSIDE a serial is a SCHEMA AMENDMENT, not a data entry. So
+          the regex above cannot represent the ampersand-bearing subset of
+          Virginia personalized plates and does not try to. `matching: strict`
+          is still correct — the regex is NARROWER than what Virginia issues,
+          and §2.7 says narrower is strict — but a real plate reading "M&M"
+          will not match, and that is a KNOWN, SOURCED false negative rather
+          than a defect. See the file-level gap list and the group dossier;
+          North Carolina independently confirms the same problem with a
+          larger glyph set, which is what makes this an amendment rather than
+          a curiosity.
+    design:
+      plate: { unit: in }
+      background: { finish: retroreflective }
+      note: "a personalized message may be applied to standard or special plate designs; where the design carries a logo (military, university), the logo position is fixed and reduces the characters available, and adding the International Symbol of Access reduces them further (DMV)"
+    fee: "$10 per year plus the prescribed state plate fee; where the underlying plate is a special plate, $10 plus the special-plate fee plus the state plate fee (§ 46.2-726)"
+    content_policy: >-
+      DMV will deny an application whose character combination carries a
+      connotation reasonably seen as profane, obscene or vulgar; sexually
+      explicit or graphic; excretory-related; describing intimate body parts
+      or genitals; condoning or encouraging violence; or describing illegal
+      activities or substances. DMV also reserves recall and cancellation, and
+      states that in deciding it "may consider bumper stickers, decals,
+      magnets, pictures and/or any other material affixed to the vehicle which
+      would influence how a person viewing the license plate would interpret
+      the message" — the surrounding-context rule, which is unusual and
+      quotable.
+    statutory_bar: "§ 46.2-726: no reserved-character plate may be issued to or renewed for any owner or co-owner registered under the Sex Offender and Crimes Against Minors Registry Act (§ 9.1-900 et seq.) if the requested combination could be read, interpreted or understood to be a reference to children"
+    region_encoding: none
+    sources:
+      - "https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title46.2/chapter6/section46.2-726/  # § 46.2-726: the Commissioner's discretion to reserve numbers/letters, the $10 fee structure, the sex-offender-registry bar, and issuance for emergency medical services vehicles"
+      - "https://www.dmv.virginia.gov/vehicles/license-plates/personalized-policy  # DMV: 'Use any combination of letters, numbers and the special characters dash, space and ampersand'; the logo/ISA character-count effects; the full denial criteria; the recall power and the surrounding-material rule"
+    notes: >-
+      VIRGINIA PERSONALIZED. Modelled as its own series because the SERIAL
+      SOURCE differs — owner-chosen rather than Commissioner-assigned — which
+      is a format property. The headline is the ampersand: this is the first
+      of two independent, officially-sourced US findings in group southeast-a
+      of a state permitting a non-alphanumeric glyph inside a serial (North
+      Carolina is the other, and its set is wider). PRD-PLATES §2.6 anticipated
+      exactly this case and prescribed the remedy — an amendment to
+      _meta/separators.yml's `never_separator` list, with sources, so every
+      consumer learns it in one place. That amendment is proposed in the group
+      dossier and is NOT made unilaterally here.
+
+  # =========================================================================
+  # SPECIALTY — PROGRAM INDEX ONLY (PRD-PLATES §2.5). Counts and official
+  # links; no individual designs.
+  # =========================================================================
+  - id: us-va-specialty-index
+    class: specialty
+    categories: [car, van, truck, bus, motorcycle, trailer]
+    period: { start: 2026 }
+    period_evidence: instrument-in-force-upper-bound
+    matching: recall-only
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLLLLLL"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z0-9](?: ?[A-Z0-9]){0,6}\z'
+      charset: { notes: "specialty serials in Virginia are not uniform — many special plates carry a shorter serial to make room for a logo — so the index entry is deliberately recall-only and makes no arrangement claim" }
+    design:
+      plate: { unit: in }
+      background: { finish: retroreflective }
+      note: "one design per authorised programme; the designs themselves are L4 scope (PRD-PLATES §2.5) and none is described here"
+      emblem: { present: true, rendered: placeholder }
+    program_index:
+      count_official: 340
+      count_official_basis: "the facet counts published by DMV's own Search/View Specialized License Plates service: Special Interest 137, College 96, Military 64, Other 43, and the service's own header 'Displaying 1 - 10 of 340' across 34 pages. 137+96+64+43 = 340, so the facets reconcile exactly with the total — a rare thing in this domain and the reason this figure is recorded as a COUNT rather than as an 'over N' estimate."
+      official_list_url: "https://www.dmv.virginia.gov/vehicles/license-plates/search"
+      categories_official: ["Special Interest", "College", "Military", "Other"]
+      statutory_structure: >-
+        VIRGINIA IS THE STATUTE-PER-PLATE STATE, AND IT IS THE MOST USEFUL
+        STRUCTURAL FACT IN THIS ENTRY. Almost every Virginia specialty plate
+        has its OWN SECTION of the Code of Virginia, in Title 46.2 Chapter 6
+        Article 10 ("Special License Plates", §§ 46.2-725 to 46.2-749.134):
+        § 46.2-728 (Great Seal of Virginia), § 46.2-728.1 (official bird and
+        floral emblem), § 46.2-730 (antique vehicles), § 46.2-738 (amateur
+        radio), § 46.2-742 (Purple Heart), § 46.2-749 (institutions of higher
+        education), § 46.2-749.2 (Chesapeake Bay), § 46.2-749.3 (clean special
+        fuel), § 46.2-749.4 (county/city/town seals), and on for roughly two
+        hundred more. Consequence: Virginia's specialty programme is an EDICT
+        OF GOVERNMENT end to end, and its authorisation, fee and eligibility
+        facts are public domain even though the ARTWORK is not (see
+        artwork_risk). Nothing similar is available for the other four states
+        in this group, where specialty programmes live in agency pages.
+      churn_visible_in_the_code: >-
+        Because each programme is a section, DEAD PROGRAMMES ARE VISIBLE AS
+        REPEALED AND EXPIRED SECTIONS in the Article 10 table of contents —
+        dozens of them, e.g. § 46.2-749.10, .11, .12 (Repealed),
+        § 46.2-749.37, .38 (Expired), § 46.2-746.4:2 (Expired). Most US
+        specialty indexes cannot distinguish "never existed" from
+        "authorised then killed"; Virginia's can, from a public-domain
+        source, at section granularity. That is a genuine differentiator and
+        the right hook for an L4 pass.
+      articles: "Article 9 (§§ 46.2-711 to 46.2-724) is 'License Plates, Generally'; Article 10 (§§ 46.2-725 onward) is 'Special License Plates'; Article 11 (§§ 46.2-750 to 46.2-756) is 'State and Local Motor Vehicle Registration'"
+    region_encoding: none
+    sources:
+      - "https://www.dmv.virginia.gov/vehicles/license-plates/search  # DMV's Search/View Specialized License Plates service: the 340 total and the four facet counts (137/96/64/43)"
+      - "https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title46.2/chapter6/  # Code of Virginia Title 46.2 Chapter 6 table of contents: Article 10 'Special License Plates' with a section per programme, and the Repealed/Expired markers that make programme churn readable"
+      - "https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title46.2/chapter6/section46.2-725/  # § 46.2-725: special license plates, generally — the frame the per-programme sections hang off"
+    notes: >-
+      THE VIRGINIA SPECIALTY PROGRAM INDEX — one entry standing for the whole
+      programme, which is what PRD-PLATES §2.5 asks for at this gate. Two
+      things to carry forward. First, the count is EXACT and RECONCILED (340,
+      facets summing to 340) rather than the "over 100"-style estimate every
+      other state in this group publishes, because DMV exposes it through a
+      faceted search rather than a brochure. Second, Virginia authorises each
+      plate by statute, so unlike Florida — where the count is contested
+      between the agency and Wikipedia and the programme list is a PDF — the
+      Virginia programme list is derivable from a public-domain edict and
+      carries its own history of repeals. If any state in the US pass deserves
+      an L4 specialty depth pass first, it is this one.