New York requires annual car inspections that include emissions testing as well as a basic safety check (tires, brakes, head/signal/brake lights, horn, fluids, and a few other things). They "only" cost $20 but they put a color coded sticker on your windshield that is easily seen by passing cops, who will pull you over if you have the wrong color. Getting the inspection done is a bit of a pain in the ass, too, as because at least for me it would usually require taking at least an hour off of work to drive the car to a garage who could do it. And the garages seemed to often run out of inspection stickers, as they're provided by the state and only allot so many to each garage that does inspections. It was kind of a nightmare in its own way.

And if your car failed inspection, you were obligated to fix it, of course. I knew a lot of people who would postpone the inspection as long as possible and hope they didn't get pulled over. When I was pretty poor I had a car that frequently had its check engine light on (an instant fail for the inspections). It was cheaper to buy an OBD reader online that could reset the check engine light long enough to get the inspection done than it was to fix the problem.

When I moved to Georgia which only does the emissions test (and only in the Atlanta area counties), I was surprised by how quick it was. Perhaps coincidentally, I see many orders of magnitude more cars engulfed in flames on the roads in metro Atlanta than I ever did in New York.