Changes are likely just around the corner in Massachusetts regarding enforcement of the license plate visibility law. If you use a rear-mounted bike rack on your car, you might be affected.

From Massachusetts General Laws: Chapter 90, Section 6 (Display of Number Plates)

“The said number plates shall be kept clean with the numbers legible and shall not be obscured in any manner by the installation of any device obscuring said numbers, and during the period when the vehicle or trailer is required to display lights the rear register number shall be illuminated so as to be plainly visible at a distance of sixty feet.”

For quite some time in Massachusetts, law enforcement officers often have looked the other way when the visibility of automobile license plates was obstructed by rear-mounted bike racks and bicycles. With the advent of a new automated tolling system coming to the Mass Pike this October, that may be about to change.

The new “gantries”, an overhead electronic system that will record license plate numbers for billing purposes on cars that do not have E-ZPass, will not be able to invoice tolls incurred on Massachusetts roads if the plate is obscured, or even partially obscured, by a rear-mounted bike rack with or without a bicycle on it. This will inevitability require enforcement of the often overlooked license plate visibility law for users on the Mass Pike.

Even those users with E-ZPass transponders are likely to be subject to this enforcement as the law does not provide an exemption for those with E-ZPass devices. If a state trooper sees an obstructed plate, you’re going to get a ticket whether you have an E-ZPass or not.

It’s not hard to imagine that once this more rigorous enforcement begins on the Mass Pike (and on other electronically tolled areas such as the Tobin Bridge), it will only be a matter of time until enforcement will spread to non-tolled roads.

There is a second component to the license plate visibility law that requires lighting of the license plate when other vehicle lights are required. This is likely to lead to some complicated and potentially expensive engineering for the cycling community.

In South Australia, special cycling license plates can be purchased that allow a plate to be attached to the bike rack itself. Once the plate is attached, however, it has to be lighted so that it is visible at night. This could become a costly proposition.

What will be the Massachusetts cycling community’s response to these changes? Is it reasonable to seek exemption from the law? What’s to stop anyone who just seeks to evade easy plate identification from just throwing a bike rack on their car to obscure their plate? It doesn’t seem likely that cyclists will be granted a special exemption.

Changes are coming in Massachusetts and they are coming soon. What’s your solution to this problem?