Few incidents over Easter

A long line of traffic follows a campervan. Photo / Warren Buckland

Motorists on Hawke's Bay roads had so far shown good Easter holiday driving sense and there had only been a couple of minor incidents, Eastern District Command Centre Senior Sergeant Nick Dobson said.

"The holiday weekend has been progressing favourably here," Mr Dobson said yesterday.

He hoped the high police presence on the region's highways and urban roads was having an effect.

Mr Dobson said the primary focus of the patrols was to cover all areas and, most importantly, to be seen.

"We have a lot of dedicated traffic staff out there for the holiday period and we are operating high-visibility checkpoints."

The "drive safe" message, however, had not got through to one man who had police arriving in Maraenui just after 8.30am yesterday.

"He has somehow managed to roll his car and he will likely be facing charges."

The man received a minor cut to his head.

Mr Dobson said police were strictly monitoring the 4km/h speed threshold which had been introduced for the holiday period.

Patrols were also staging drink-driving checkpoints as well as watching for cellphone use by drivers and the correct wearing of seat restraints.

The official Easter holiday period began at 4pm last Thursday.

It will end at 6am tomorrow.

There have been three fatalities recorded so far this Easter, at Kapiti, Canterbury and Central Otago, as against one for the entire 2015 Easter holiday period.

Statistics show that nearly half of all crashes reported during the weekend occurred on the open road.