Traffic is starting to ease for holidaymakers heading towards Auckland after their summer break.
How will Aucklanders react to a fuel tax? Photo: 123rf
The New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) says delays through Puhoi have eased, and traffic is moving well through Kawakawa.
Traffic is also slowly clearing at Warkworth, but was still heavy at Wellsford.
South of Auckland, a crash blocking the road near Huntly has been cleared, but delays are expected as traffic moves through the area.
Traffic has also eased at Katikati, north of Tauranga.
Motorists heading back into Wellington are facing 30 minute delays as they head south through Otaki, towards the Kapiti Coast.
Divers urged to be patient
NZTA national travel information manager Luigi Cappel said the poor weather forecast for the end of the week may add to the problem as people decide to cut their holiday short.
"It will be pretty heavy in most of the main routes so right from Queenstown through to Northland, really all the main holiday areas lots of people will be making their way back. With the wet weather coming I'd expect people who are going back to work next week might head back earlier than they might have."
Mr Cappel said the weather would largely determine what the traffic might look like later in the week.
"The Sunday is likely to be fairly busy but I think the weather effectively means that people might do things differently than we originally predicted.
"So for example two years ago we had the heavy rains on the first and second of January and a lot of people went home earlier which meant the traffic wasn't quite as bad at the end of the holiday period."
He said drivers should be patient and stock up on food and water before hitting the road.
Down south drivers were making the most of the newly opened State Highway 1 north of Kaikōura.
NZTA spokesperson Tresca Forrester said each day about 5000 cars were using the road.
"The busiest period seems to be between 11 and 4 and we expect this traffic to increase over the next week as everyone's on the move from new years day now."
She said there was still three single-lane sections on the state highway and also reminded drivers to be patient.
"Places like Nelson, Queenstown, Wanaka all those famous holiday hotspots you'll see alot of traffic start moving to their home destinations over the next few days and the roads will be busier."
Buses in holiday mode
Meanwhile, Wellington's regional council has apologised to some bus users after services scheduled to run to a normal timetable, stayed in holiday mode.
People who use Newlands Coach services experienced delays today as the buses ran to a Saturday timetable, instead of the weekday timetables due to start on 3 January.
Some services did not run at all.
Greater Wellington's Angus Gabara said Newlands was urgently working to get buses onto the normal weekday timetables.
He said normal services will gradually be brought back on as the week progresses.
