Well, it's about time. We (Canada) have pretty colours and braille on ours, though looking at the $20 bill I've got, the braille doesn't stand up to a lot of wear and tear. It'd be better if our money had way more plastic in it so it could hold that for longer.

i just want another reason to learn braille.
feeling up fire extinguishers gets old.

I'm surprised it's taken this long. America must hate the seeing impaired :-(

i am seeing a lot of bitching about this ruling. the usual "activist judge" stuff. kinda surprises me, although i guess it shouldn't.

British currency is different sizes and also different colours. There's also a plasticy bit on one side which is in different positions depending on the note. That's pretty much all you need for the blind. Braille on the currency would be nice too, but I don't think it's needed.

American money is pretty awful though. I understand there are a lot of you, there's a lot of currency that is used overseas and stuff and it would cost a lot to upgrade it but come on - make an effort.

My favourite notes has to be Australian currency. That rocks.

Also in the UK every few years we re-design one of our bank notes, so, in rotation, every five years or so there'll be a new twenty, tenner, or fiver. The reason for this is so that armed robbers, fraudsters, etc., who have buried their loot will find they can't spend it when they come out of prison after serving a long sentence.

I've seen this as plot points in movies but i didn't know there was this constant exchange of money.
What about people who hide it in their mattress?
Since they finally changed some anyway, i wouldn't mind little plasticy bits on money. That would finally help solve some of the counterfeit problems.
But it seems like you should be able to use old money. In the US, you can send your burned and trashed money into the treasury for usable money. In fact, if you really cared, you could get slightly more than your money by carefully destroying it and sending it in.

What about people who hide it in their mattress?

There's always a lot of publicity in the media for several months before a change in banknotes and people are given a few months grace after the changeover to swap it for the new currency. I think if it's more than a couple of thou they have to provide ID for money-laundering purposes, which is likely to deter the criminal element.