The DEQ exhaust check is a complete boondoggle on tax payer monies. 1) Any car registered outside of PDX does NOT get tested or have to comply with emissions standards. BUT all vehicles are allowed to drive anywhere! So absolutely no effect in air quality related to this antiquated program! 2) Washington state has eliminated the program in 2019. Reason = not needed & inefficient use of public funds, along with no correlation to air quality! So why is this forced to continue when you can register any car outside of Portland, and pollute away inside of Oregon. Create jobs for unskilled laborers?
The real irritation with Washington States b/s inspection is that the company that ran the rip off was owned by BP petroleum which is really owned by the old bat and her family of in breads that run England. The cost was $20.00 of which 1/2 went directly to her back pocket. Then they came up with the $150.00 waiver fee that allowed anyone to pay the fee and continue to pollute. Yet another government program that was good to start until the bozo's in Olympia got their hands on it and like a typical bureaucrat screwed it up. Just sayin' tr0768
Oregon thrives on inefficient use of public funds Coming soon, 12 “new” miles of Light rail line for .......$3 Billion bucks. It’s a steal at $250,000,000.00 per mile .......lol. .......it will be up to $4-5 Billion by the time they get it done.
In WA, all cars 2009 (that met CA CARB requirements) and newer never needed emissions testing. This is because 2009 cars were required to fully insturment all emissions parts and throw a check engine if there was an issue. The orginal reason for emissions is that in the 70's there was so much pollution it was hard to see (in S. Cali) etc and it was a danger to health. So they put these in place and started working on emissions requirements for manufacturers. It was a pretty good success as it did indeed reduce the polutants significantly. It was normal to see a few cars spewing smoke and (see from instrumentation) hydrocarbon and other nasties that were horrific. Now you don't see that. Now you have fairly clean air in comparison and have many more cars. They were finding that with the average car life being what it was, there were a lot less cars getting emissioned than a decade ago. The air is cleaner, the emissions equipment is instrumented. It doesn't make sense to continue. The $150 fee was not a fee. It was that you had to spend $150 at a certified emissions mechanic to fix emissions after the first failure. Then you go a 2nd time and if you had spent at least $150 you still passed. Oregon will catch up. I think it is still on the books due to portland being abit "green" and slow lawmakers. Maybe they make big money on it but in WA it is likely a loss at this time so they shut it down.
While they are at it, they should do away with the front plate requirement. However, I don't see either of those happening as the SEIU will want to keep the jobs and the greenies want anything which is "green." Unstoppable combination there. The SEIU runs the political machine anyway, and nothing happens in the state without their approval.
No, but getting rid of the DEQ testing stations will! And, their leadership is generally anti-car and pro-mass transit (plenty of SEIU members there!), so anything which makes car ownership easier or better isn't popular with them. However, at least they like jobs, unlike the Seattle city council!
So in WA we make something like 800,000 plates a year and we have inmades make them. They have to be replaced every 7 years because of the reflective coating. The only thing I can think about is the reflective coating company lobbies WA lawmakers so they can sell twice as much coating (unlikley), Police departments want front plates for easier identification, or Police departments use the plate to radar cars. This last piece might be true but not required as they can just point at a headlight which works well. I think 19 states or so don't require a front plate. I don't see why we need to have two plates. They got rid of the tabs for front plates a long time ago.
That's actually kinda helpful when I'm driving the California alone. Sticky gas door makes getting it open a 2 person job. Most of the time they ask if I want to pump it myself. I don't usually take them up on it.
It's like $40 every two years .. who cares? I don't disagree with your logic it's just not a huge inconvenience for me to comply with it. Front plates on the other hand....
When you start to have a bunch of cars, it seems like there are always one or two which have to go in... then you have to wait in line, or they're closed, or whatever. It's really not the money-- I think we all need to appreciate how good we have it in Oregon from the money point of view-- it's just the continual hassle. The next car I buy will either be 1974 or older, or get an SP plate.
Years ago WA exempted vehicles from the front plates if the vehicle wasn't manufactured with a front plate bracket. But they stopped about ten years ago. I was going to buy an 08 Vette new in central Washington State and asked the dealer how Vette owners got away with no front plate in WA.
Oregon has taken a step towards eliminating the DEQ test stations. At Jiffy Lube one can purchase a dongle that works with the Shell Fitcar app. At renewal time plug in dongle to OMBD and follow instructions on app. It took a long drive in diesel Cayenne to get the codes to clear, but eventually cleared and I went online to renew. But, at noted above, there are SEIU jobs that would disappear if DEQ was shut down.
coming from California, I think you guys have it very easy up there. We have to test emmisions, need front plates, and now they are even ticketing if your car is too loud driving up the coast......Registration for my car was like 1k a year, gas down here was like $4.450 a gallon..... I might be moving up here for work, so I hope to get back into a 458 and enjoy some of the roads up there.
if I end up there which is likely, there is no way im putting a front plate on a 458 Ill pay the stupid fix it ticket. The R8 I had in the past had the plate to from Oregon. Again, ill pay the fix it ticket.
You only need the front plate if you park the car on the street in the city of Portland. If you don't have one, you WILL get a ticket, and they will make you pay it (they don't care if you put a front plate on-- it's purely a revenue deal). So it's cheaper to park in a garage if you bring your car downtown with no front plate. Then no issues.
Cheers Don. They'd need to charge me a fair bit more than eighty-five bucks before I'd bolt on a front plate.
That is true, but it does make parking awfully expensive at $85/time plus the hourly fees! And they will get you EVERY time you park in downtown, trust me. Much, much cheaper to park in one of the many garages, even at $12-16/hour.