The official Labour Weekend road toll began at 4pm on Friday and ended at 6am today.
As of late last night, there had been no fatalities on New Zealand’s roads, despite very challenging wet and snowy weather across the southern regions for much of the three-day weekend.
A police spokeswoman told the Otago Daily Times late yesterday, the result was "pleasing — touch wood", but she was mindful that the holiday weekend period had not yet officially finished.
"On a holiday weekend, we do make sure we have a high police presence on the roads to encourage people to keep driving safely.
"It’s pleasing that on the whole, that’s been the case — especially considering the weather conditions [were] so poor.
"It’s great that people heeded police advice to drive to the conditions and drive safely."
She also praised drivers for stopping and having a rest when they were feeling fatigued.
While there was congestion on some highways around the country as people returned home, drivers had appeared to be patient and drove at safe speeds.
Although there were no fatalities, there were several crashes across Otago and Southland over the weekend.
However, the injuries in those crashes were minor, she said.
"On any given weekend, you would expect a crash or two.
"You couldn’t necessarily attribute any specific crashes this weekend to holiday traffic issues, so it’s important to keep that in mind as well.
"There weren’t any crashes that were serious this weekend — so it seems everyone had a nice holiday," she said.
