The long-term survival rate for the typical car is only about 1%......ie, if 400,000 Buicks were sold in a particular year, eventually there will be only about 4000 kept as collectors vehicles. For some, survival is much less.....higher for Corvettes, Rolls-Royces, etc. So the impact of old cars lessens every year.
Those unleaded vehicles from 1975 on have catalytic converters......it's illegal to remove them......how many states inspect to see they still have them? There have been noise standards for motor vehicles for many years.......why are trucks still so noisy. Why are motorcyclists allowed to remove baffles and mufflers as soon as they buy them and make all that noise (even brag about "rolling thunder")????? And talk about pollution: seems motorcycles survive forever: do you think they aren't polluting?
When a new car is smogged it is all done with computers. The test station plugs their computer into the port for the cars computer and the test is done between the two. No computer in most cars before 81 and those between 81 and 95 are OBD1 systems that aren't compatible with the OBD2 testing systems of today. Setting up a separate lane for older cars in each city doing testing would cost millions of dollars. How much are you willing to pay in taxes for this to happen?
Cars have to come up to the emmision standards of the time they where made.
1975, emmions standards pretty much didn't exist, and the cars wouldn't pass modern standards, even when they where new. Now to retroactively pass a law that would require them to modified to meet modern standards isn't practical and would have all the legit classic and vintage car owners up in arms.
Because mechanically they were not engineered or designed to be able to even come close to today's emissions standards.
From years 1975 and below. Where I live blacks love to have and drive old cars from 1975 to below and when I'm driving behind an old car it stinks and smells really bad? Why do old cars don't need to be Smogged if some old cars really smell bad?
