License plate graphic for Yala province

Yesterday, the background graphic for the license plates in Yala have been announced in the Royal Gazette. This is apparently the first-ever such graphic for Yala since the first such graphics were announced in 2004, at least I never saw any announcement for this province so far. The only other province which has never been assigned such a colorful background is Mae Hong Son, I can only guess that in these two provinces there was not much interest in the bidding for special license codes, as these colorful backgrounds are only available for these special codes as an additional status symbol.

The graphic shows both the hills at the border to Malaysia and the coastal landscape at the Gulf of Thailand. The two bird-cages to the left refer to the local tradition of songbird contests, the man with a blowpipe to the Negrito tribes who were originally living in the borderland to Malaysia. To the right is a postal box from the southernmost town Betong (เบตง). As it has this reference to Betong, I suspect that the graphical license plate is also used for Betong - the only district in Thailand which has its separate license plate and does not use the provincial license plate.

Though still incomplete, a lot of the graphics of the other provinces can be found in my album of the license plate backgrounds, and I also have compiled a spreadsheet showing which provinces have received a license plate in which year - as I guess most reader won't be able to read the full XML data for these announcements.

New provincial license plates

On December 27th four announcements regarding the colorful provincial license plates were published in the Royal Gazette. Samut Songkhram is about the last province which now has such a graphic defined (only Yala and Mae Hong Son have none yet), the three other announcements only added a new design for the respective province.

• Phetchabun: a completely new design added, showing the highlights of Khao Kho district - the hill with Wat Phra That Pha Son Kaeo (วัดพระธาตุผาซ่อนแก้ว) with a misty background, and inserted at the right the Khao Kho Memorial (อณุสรณ์สถานผู้เสียสละเขาค้อ) commemorating the victims of the communist insurgency 1965-1982. The 2013 design still looked very different. [Gazette]
  
• Surin: Comparing with the plate announced in 2012, only the elephants are present in both designs. In the upper left corner are the flowers of the provincial symbol flower Fagraea fragrans. The upper right shows the Tha Sawang silk. However, I don't know which pier and body of water is depicted. [Gazette]
  
• Roi Et: The new plate has the same elements as the plate announced in 2015, the only difference is the purple background instead of a green background in 2015. [Gazette]
  
• Samut Songkhram: The license plate shows the same elements as the provincial seal - a drum (Klong) on the Mae Klong river with coconut trees on both sides. [Gazette]
  

My album of provincial license plates is still incomplete and badly sorted... I have also prepared a spreadsheet listing the years by which plates were announced for each province.

New license plate graphics

A week ago, five new provincial license plate graphics were announced in the Royal Gazette.

• Trat [Gazette]
  
  The graphic refers to the Franco-Thai war (1940-41), more specifically the battle of Ko Chang on January 17 1941. Three Thai ships were sunk during the battle, thus probably the ships to the right in the graphic are depicting the HTMS Chonburi, HTMS Songkhla and HTMS Thonburi.
  This seems to be first design for a license plate for Trat, there were no previous designs announced.
• Phetchabun [Gazette]
  
  To the left of the design are the fruits of the Tamarind tree, an important local product of Phetchabun province. The tamarind is also the provincial symbol tree for Ühetchabun. The star above and next to the tamarind fruits refers to the name of the province - Phetcha (เพชร) means diamond. The temple on the hill to the right is Wat Phra Son Kaeo (วัดพระธาตุผาแก้ว), one of the most spectacular Buddhist temples in the province.
  While the tamarind was present in the 2005 and 2009 designs as well, the temple was newly added, also the background was made much more colorful than before.
• Amnat Charoen [Gazette]
  
  To the right are rice ears, as (sticky) rice is the major agricultural product of the province. The flowers to the right are from the Butea monosperma tree, the symbol flower of the province. The background shows Khit cloth, a traditional woven fabric still produced in the traditional way in some areas of the Northeast, including Amnat Charoen.
  This seems to be first design for a license plate for Amnat Charoen, there were no previous designs announced.
• Chiang Mai [Gazette]
  
  As the 10 year loan of the to Panda to Chiang Mai Zoo has ended, the new license plate graphic - unlike the previous one from 2011 - no longer show any Panda. Again, Butea monosperma flowers are depicted, as this is also the provincial flower for Chiang Mai (and also Udon Thani and Lamphun). On the hill in the background the temple Wat Prathat Doi Saket is shown, one of the most famous temples in Thailand. To the left is a traditional Lanna house, with two Thais celebrating Songkhran by splashing with water. At the river another two persons celebrate Loi Krathong by floating the little candle boats. I am just not sure which temple is shown in the middle of the graphic.
• Maha Sarakham [Gazette]
  
  Again, Khit cloth is shown, as it is also a local product for Maha Sarakham. The flowers on top of the cloth are from the provincial flower, the White Frangipani (Plumeria alba). The river is the Chi river. The temple silhouette in the background probably is the pagoda of Wat Phra That Na Dun, located in Na Dun district.
  The 2006 design showed only the cloth and the flower.

As usual, I have added these graphics to the web album, where one can find all the recent graphics and many of the older as well - if times allows I will slowly complete it with all the old ones as well. If there is one specific missing, please let me know. After this announcements, there are still five provinces which seem to have such graphic yet, I don't know whether the announcements were not published in the Royal Gazette, or there is really no such designs yet for Nong Bua Lamphu, Mae Hong Son, Samut Songkhram, Ranong and Yala.

License plate designs for Satun, Loei and Kamphaeng Phet

End of last year, four license plate graphic designs were announced in the Royal Gazette, however I only showed Bueng Kan in detail then and promised to post about the other later. Well, being busy with other things, this slipped through until I was now asked by email for two of these three.

• Satun [Gazette]: Since the province is located at the Andaman sea, the graphic shows a beach scene. The rocks in the lower left look like they refer to Hin Ngam island, but for the other two rock structures I am not sure if they refer to a real place or are just an artists impression. However strangely this graphic is identical with the design already announced in 2008, so I don't understand why there was a new announcement.
• Loei [Gazette]: The design is a variation of the 2007 design [Gazette], still showing the Phu Kradueng hill with its plateau on top, a pine tree in front of the Lom Sak cliff also within Phu Kradueng National Park, and three acorn leaves - which however now look quite different from the ones in 2007. A new element added this time is the Phi Ta Khon mask.
• Kamphaeng Phet [Gazette]: The design for kamphaeng Phet changes a lot compared with the 2006 design [Gazette], the only element present in both designs are the banana trees. Newly added is a rice plant to the right, a waterfall in the background - probably Khlong Lan waterfall. Most prominently is the city wall, obviously referring to the name of the province which translates to "Diamond Wall".

Graphical license plate for Phetchaburi

Today, a new graphical car license plate was announced for Phetchaburi province [Gazette], replacing the design originally announced in 2005 [Gazette].

2013

2005

Comparing the two design, one can easily find the new elements. In the background is Phra Nakhon Khiri with the fireworks of the annual festival, held in the beginning of April. Also new are the two Garuda figures, though I don't know how these are special for this province. The flowers, fruits and the local sweets have been moved together to the left side - the palm trees as the source of the palm sugar as the main ingredient for these sweets are now much smaller and spread in the background.

License plate graphic for Kanchanaburi

Yet another updated graphical car license plate, this time for the province of Kanchanaburi announced in the Royal Gazette last Friday.

2013

The symbolism of the graphic is clear - Kanchanaburi is a popular province for tourists and all of the items found in the graphic are well-known attractions in the province.Most prominently is the railway bridge of the River Kwae (The Bridge on the River Kwai) to the left. Below the bridge is one of the river restaurants, which are found a lot in Kanchanaburi town. To the right are the Three Pagodas found at the boundary to Myanmar at the Three Pagodas Pass. The waterfall below is the Sai Yok waterfall. The setting sun in the middle refers to the location of the province in the west of Thailand - the Thai word for "west" translates as "where the sun sets".

 

2006

The design announced in 2006 [Gazette] also shows the bridge and the pagodas, and I assume the somewhat strange looking water at the left border is again the Sai Yok waterfall.

New car license plate graphic for Khon Kaen

I still haven't yet written the article on the remaining three new license plate graphics published on Christmas, now another graphic was announced, this time for Khon Kaen. It is in fact already the third design for Khon Kaen, changed every four years.

2013

The new design [Gazette] shows at top two branches of the Yellow Shower Tree (ราชพฤกษ์, Ratchaphruek), the symbol tree of the province. The stupa to the left is Phra That Kham Kaen, which is also the main item on the seal of the province. I am not sure about the symbolism of the tree trunk in middle, I only know that the provincial seal features two trees to either side of the stupa - but there is a similar looking trunk in front of the railway station of Khon Kaen. At both sides there is a yellow cartoon dinosaur, one holding a khene and the other doing a Thai greeting.

2010

The 2010 design [Gazette] is similar, but instead of the two small cartoon dinosaurs a real dinosaur is depicted, probably the Phuwiangosaurus sirindhornae which was discovered in Phu Wiang district.

2004

Finally, the 2004 design [Gazette] lacks the stupa and places the dinosaur much more into the background. For me, it is the visually least appealing design, but that's of course just my subjective impression.

License plate background for Bueng Kan

Over the Christmas days, the Royal Gazette continued to publish announcements since these days are no holidays in Thailand. On the 25th, four announcements of provincial graphical license plates for passenger cars were published, among them the license plate for the latest province Bueng Kan created in 2011.

The graphic shows the same elements already present on the provincial seal - Phu Tok hill, the abundant water in the province, most notably the Mekong river, and the forests. Especially if comparing with the colored province seal, the similarity of the two artworks becomes obvious.

The other three provinces which get a new license plate are Satun, Kamphaeng Phet and Loei. I will write up a separate blogpost on them in the next days, but for those who cannot wait can find the graphic already in the web album.

Three new license plate graphics

On Monday, three new province graphics for car license plates were announced.

• Udon Thani [Gazette] The artwork has changed quite a bit, though the main elements of the 2005 design are still present - the pottery from Ban Chiang, the peculiar shaped rock of Phu Phra Bat Buabok and some orchid flowers. Newly added are other artifacts from Ban Chiang, the large lotus field of Kumpawapi lake, and the provincial flower Flame of the forest to the left.
• 
  Phang Nga [Gazette] The graphics is almost identical with the one announced back in 2008 - only the colors have slightly more contrast now.
• 
  Suphanburi [Gazette] It is already the third design announced for Suphanburi. Compared to the previous one from 2010, no new symbols were added, only the Suphanburi tower as well as the Dragon Museum are now placed as photographs instead of drawings - which to me make them look rather artificial within the design.

Graphical license plate for Narathiwat

Yesterday the car license plate graphic for the province Narathiwat was announced in the Royal Gazette. As Narathiwat is located at the coast of the Gulf of Thailand, the symbolism of the sea and the typical Malay style boat in the graphic is obvious. However, I have no idea what is the symbolism of the branch with the three-colored leaves to the right - they look like Lotus leaves, definitely neither the leaves of the provincial tree Neobalanocarpus heimii nor the provincial flower Odontadenia macrantha.

What is interesting is that unlike the other graphical license plates announced recently, in this case it is not a new version of an already existing graphic - so far Narathiwat did not have any graphical license plaes. Or to be more exact, there was none announced in the Royal Gazette so far, not sure if the car registration office in Narathiwat used one before which was not officially announced. There are only very few provinces which have no such graphic announced yet - Bueng Kan as the most recently created province, Amnat Charoen, Mae Hong Son, Nong Bua Lamphu, Ranong, Samut Songkhram, Trat and Yala. And there is also the special case of Betong district in Narathiwat, which has a separate car registration, and thus might have a graphical license plate someday. Or it may now use the one from Narathiwat province.

License plate update for Phrae province

Yesterday a new license plate graphic for Phrae province was announced in the Royal Gazette, overriding the design announced in 2004.

The new design shows . In the background are the special rock formations of Phae Mueang Phi (แพะเมืองผี, literally "goat ghost town"), located about 10km northeast of the town Phrae.The blue wave in front probably refers to the Yom river, which flows through the province. The bird to the bottom right is a Siamese Fireback (Lophura diardi), which is found in the province. I am not sure what the tree in the left background are supposed to mean however.

The old design did only show the rock formations of Phae Mueang Phi.

For details on the next auction of these plates, the Phrae office of the Department of Land Transport has a brochure on their website.

Sakon Nakhon license plate change reverted

2011 license plate

2006 license plate

November last year, a new license plate graphic for Sakon Nakhon was announced, changing the design completely [Gazette] -instead of the city gate (ประตูสัญลักษณ์เมืองสกลนคร) it now shows Phra That Choeng Chum (พระธาตุเชิงชุม), the major Buddhist site of the province, and a Bee Palace (แห่ปราสาทผึ้ง), made from bee wax in the most important a local festival.

Already in April . but I just notice it now - a new announcement was published which nullifies the new license plate announcement [Gazette]. The main sentence within the announcement is the following:

รูปแบบใหม่ของจังหวัดสกลนคร โดยมีลายกราฟฟิกพื้นหน้าแผ่นป้ายเป็นรูปพระธาตุเชิงชุม อันเป็นสิ่งศักดิ์สิทธิ์เคารพบูชาของชาวสกลนคร ซึ่งพิจารณาแล้วเห็นว่าไม่เหมาะสม
New look of Sakon Nakhon which has a graphic on the license plate with a picture of Phra That Choeng Chum, a sacred item of worship for the people of Sakon Nakhon. This is considered inappropriate and not suitable.

Besides this announcement, there have two further announcements on new license plare graphics, but sadly in both cases the PDF from the Royal Gazette website lacks the appendix with the actual graphic, thus I only mention them shortly here and don't give them a full posting as I would do normally. I just hope these were exceptions, and future announcements will include the graphic again, as it seems these announcements is the only source of where one can find good depictions of the license plates on the web.

• Lamphun province, announced June 28. [Gazette]
• Krabi province, announced April 4, [Gazette]

License plate update for Nakhon Si Thammarat

I almost missed another license plate graphic announcement, as on March 21 a new graphic for Nakhon Si Thammarat was published in the Royal Gazette. The graphic shows the natural abundance in the province in the middle - fish, palm trees and birds. To the left is a shadow play figure, in the special style only found in this province. I am not sure what is the special meaning of the dancer to the right, probably a special cultural feature of the province.

Nakhon Si Thammarat 2012

Interestingly, when comparing the graphic with the one published in 2006 [Gazette], one notices that the graphic is in fact identical, the only difference are the colors - whereas in 2006 the dancer and shadow play figure are in purple and white, in 2012 especially the dancer is much more colorful.

Nakhon Si Thammarat 2006

As these license plate graphics are becoming a quite popular topic of this blog, and I was just asked about it, I checked through the Royal Gazette announcements to check which provinces have not received any license plate graphic yet. Interestingly, this is not just the recently created province Bueng Kan, but another seven further one - Amnat Charoen, Nong Bua Lamphu, Mae Hong Son, Samut Songkhram, Ranong, Narathiwat and Yala. And maybe Betong could also be missing, as that district has its own license plates and does not use the one of Yala province. I have no idea if these provinces really have no graphic yet, or if these graphics were only not published in the Royal Gazette.

New license plate graphics

Yesterday, a new version of the car license plate graphic for the province Buriram was published in the Royal Gazette. The graphic shows the Khmer temple of Phanom Rung, one of eight historical parks in Thailand. If comparing it with the original graphic announced in 2006 [Gazette], the main difference is that now the rainbow now spreads over the complete building, whereas originally it was only in the left half.

Buriram 2006

Buriram 2012

Together with this announcement, I noticed that I had missed four more similar announcements in the last four months. I have added all these to the license plate Picasa webalbum - which however is still incomplete, I haven't yet extracted and cut all the graphics from the PDF files.

• Surin, announced in January [Gazette], updating the graphic from 2006 [Gazette]. In fact, both graphics are almost identical, the graphics in the two announcements only differ in the color saturation.
  
• Sakon Nakhon, announced in November [Gazette], a completely new design compared with the one from 2006 [Gazette].
  
• Phra Nakhon Si Ayutthaya, announced in November [Gazette], changing the design from 2006 [Gazette] by adding an industrial estate at the bottom right, and a second flower to the right.
  
• Mukdahan, also announced in November [Gazette], the first graphic for this province published in the Gazette. Would be interesting to know if there were no graphic license plates in this province so far, or if the publication in the Gazette was just omitted.
  

License plate for Phayao

Following an inquiry by email on the provincial vanity license plates for four province I did not have in the Picasa album yet (of which Mae Hong Son and Nong Bua Lamphu seem to be not announced at all yet), I noticed that I had totally missed five announcements this year with new license plate images. I have posted all the images to Picasa already, but since the last was from earlier this month it is still not too old to get a dedicated posting on its announcement.

2011 Phayao plate

In fact, the plate for Phayao has been revised, as there was already one graphic announced in 2005. The new graphic shows the Phayao lake together with some lotus flowers and a longtail boat, and a rising (or setting) sun in the hills. The announcement was published October 12 2011 [Gazette].

2005 Phayao plate

The 2005 version of the plate [Gazette] is more simplistic, it also shows the Phayao lake as the main geographical feature of the province, together with a longtail boat. The main color is however a tone of pink, which has been replaced with the more yellow tone in the new design.


And just for completion, the other four provinces which got new license plate graphics were Nonthaburi, Nong Khai, Nakhon Sawan and Chaiyaphum.

Trang license plate graphic

On July 7, a new provincial license plate graphic was announced in Royal Gazette, this time for Trang province. As Trang is located at the Andaman Sea, its not surprising that the graphic features a maritime image of two dugong, the South-East Asian relative of the manatee. Also visible are the many corals and other sea life found at the coast of Trang, and two island hills in the background. I cannot recognize if these hills are in fact modeled after two real hills - but shouldn't be modeled after Ko Phi Phi as that belongs to Krabi province.

Trang 2011

Actually, the current announcement is only a recap of an earlier one from 2004, which already announced a very similar graphic [Gazette]. The only bigger difference between the two graphics is at the left side, where the number of waves has been reduced and some fish have been added. The different colors are probably just because of the different way of placing the image into the PDF - in 2004 it was a scanned paper copy, whereas now it was probably directly created from the digital original.

Trang 2004

License plate images for Chiang Rai and Saraburi

Last Friday, two new provincial license plate graphics were published in the Royal Gazette. Actually, only one is new, as for Saraburi I wasn't able to see any significant difference to an earlier one from 2006. For Chiang Rai, while some elements were reused, the graphic is different from the previous one announced in 2005.

The graphic for Saraburi [Gazette] shows the seal of the province in the middle placed on a large sunflower field. The main symbol of the seal is Wat Phra Phutthabat, the most important temple of the province. Both the temple as well as the sunflower fields are the major tourist attractions of the province. The graphic from 2006 is almost identical, only the colors are less intense.

The graphic for Chiang Rai [Gazette] is dominated by the Phu Chi Fa cliff, from where the sea of clouds can be seen at sunrise if weather allows, with the lower hills peeking through the morning mist. The tower to the left probably refers to Wat Rong Khun. the famous white temple built by renowned artist Chaloemchai Khositphiphat. However the yellow color - the temple is actually bright white - and the clock confuse me a bit. In the 2005 version, this tower wasn't present yet, and the cliff and clouds had a different design. The rising sun was omitted in the new graphic however.

New provincial license plate images

Two new provincial license plate backgrounds have been announced in the Royal Gazette, both replacing older designs.

The Chanthaburi license plate [Gazette] shows gemstones to the right and some kinds of fruits (Rambutan, Mongosteen and Durian) to the left. In the background is the rising sun pointing to the location in the East, and a hill with two waterfalls. Fruits (and especially Durian) as well as gemstones are the most important products from this province, and in the hills of the province many waterfalls are popular touristic locations.


In fact, the graphic is identical with the one published in 2004 [Gazette], or instead of a scan the announcement now contains a vector drawing (however saved as a JPG in the PDF), so only the colors look much more clear now. I have uploaded the old graphic to the Picasa album as well.

For Lopburi [Gazette] I am not sure what the graphics is supposed to mean. The statues in background look like Khmer style stone carvings and thus probably point to the many Khmer ruins still present in the province - most notably Prang Sam Yot as one of the attractions of Lopburi town. I however cannot get the meaning of the four puppets in front - or are they in fact monkeys, as the wild monkeys in the city are also very iconic for Lopburi.


The graphic looks very similar with the previously announced one from 2005 [Gazette], only the arrangement of the puppets and statues is changed a bit - see it here.

New license plate images

Four new license plate background images were announced in the Royal Gazette recently, one was an updated design and for three there was no design yet.

• Suphanburi [Gazette]
  The dragon from the new Chinese heritage museum next to the city pillar shrine was added to the previous design. The other element easily to recognize is the observation tower in Suphanburi city. I am not sure what the various animals stand for, they might point to the zoo and aquarium at Bueng Chawak.
  
  
• Khon Kaen [Gazette]
  The license plate shows a dinosaur, referring to the Phu Wiang Dinosaur Museum. The dinosaurs first discovered in the hills of Phu Wiang have their scientific names pointing to their Thai origin - Phuwiangosaurus sirindhornae, Siamosaurus suteethorni, Siamotyrannus isanensis, Kinnareemimus khonkaenensis. The flowers are from the provincial flower, the Golden Shower Tree.
  
  
  
• Nakhon Phanom [Gazette]
  The design for Nakhon Phanom shows three boats floating on the Mekong river.
  
• Phitsanulok [Gazette]
  The license plate for Phitsanulok is rather crowded. The flowers in the middle are probably the flowers of the provincial tree Millingtonia hortensis. To the right is the dam of the Huai Nam Khem reservoir. The cock below it is the Naresuan Fighting Cock, the local breed of cock. The rafting boat refers to the Khek river, said to be most difficult of all rafting rivers in Thailand. Phitsanulok has several waterfalls, but from the photo in the Wikipedia article the one depicted might be Kaeng Sopha waterfall.
  
  

If you can add anything to the above descriptions feel free to post a comment to this article, as I am no specialist about all the local specialties which could make it on these license plates.

I am slowly filling an album with all the designs, including the ones which were updated already. It seems there is no good website which collects them all in a reasonable resolution, so it seems I can fill a gap again.

But the best ever license plate in Thailand was posted on Twitter quite some time ago, but you'd need some Thai knowledge to get its meaning.