Toronto police are struggling as more drivers use license plate plastic covers.
The use of license plate covers, which are commonly seen on cars driving on Ontario’s roads, is illegal under the traffic law.
This is because even if it is made of transparent plastic, it is difficult for the police to accurately identify the license plate number. Some products are designed to make it difficult for stop sign and speed cameras to identify license plates of offending vehicles.
These products are readily available on the online store Amazon and auction site eBay, or at Canadian Tire retail stores. However, in recent years, sales of these products have increased significantly in Ontario, causing controversy.
The problem is that while selling license plate covers is legal, installing them on vehicles is illegal.
Over the past three years, the number of vehicles using license plate covers filmed by Toronto’s automated enforcement cameras has skyrocketed. According to data from the city of Toronto, in 2020 alone, 11,000 photos, or about 5.3% of all photos taken, were discarded because license plates failed to read due to blurry images. By 2022, the cumulative number of unreadable photos reached 82,000, accounting for 18% of the total number of violating vehicle shootings.
A Toronto Police official admitted that the current traffic enforcement officers are focusing on four violations: speeding, drinking, distraction, and dangerous driving, and that license plate cover enforcement is not working well. However, he emphasized that it is illegal, saying, “Plastic covers reduce the legibility of license plates and cause other problems such as glare.”
Allison Stewart, co-principal of Cycle of Toronto, a bicycle advocacy group, said, “Not only the use of license plate covers should be banned, but the sale as well.”