While the holiday season is approaching, you might not be able to travel by road from Kamloops to the Lower Mainland to visit friends or family, at least not at the moment.

That is because there is no timeline as to when the essential travel restrictions could be lifted on Highways 3 and 99.

Transportation Minister Rob Fleming says that is especially the case on Highway 3, between Hope and Princeton, where semis travelling between Metro Vancouver and the B.C. Interior will have priority.

“All I’m saying is that right now, we’ve been able to restore some highway access but the main Interior route continues to be the Number 3 and we are prioritizing that for commercial vehicles, he said Monday.

“So I can’t give a day about when that might be reopened to general travel. A lot of this is tied to progress we’re trying to make on Highway 5.”

Highway 5 – the Coquihalla from Hope to Merritt – isn’t expected to reopen to essential travel until the end of January. Highway 1 through the Fraser Canyon is a little ahead of that schedule, though it isn’t expected to open until mid-January.

While Highway 99 between Pemberton and Lillooet does connects Metro Vancouver to the Interior, Fleming says anything larger than a cube van is too big for that highway.

These travel restrictions mean that some people are planning to drive through the United States to get to and from the Interior this holiday season, something Fleming says he is aware of.

“We’re also working with the transportation sector including the airline industry to look at flights from Abbotsford Airport, Vancouver Airport, Victoria to destinations in the Interior of the province – Kelowna, Kamloops,” he said.

“The airline industry is obviously interested in seeing what kind of additional regional and holiday service they can province.”

While trucks have priority, people can still travel on Highway 3 if it is for an essential reason as defined by the provincial government.

“Right now it would not be very pleasant to get into your car and drive to a ski hill from the Lower Mainland to the Interior [on Highway 3],” Fleming added.

“There’s a lot of trucks there. Its a very busy corridor. Its slow and winding. Takes approximately twice as long to get from Surrey to Keremeos. The good news though is that its open and its moving and that commercial trucks are able to get goods and supplies to the other parts of British Columbia.”

However, he’s also said Monday that there have been too many crashes on Highway 3, and he’s urging drivers to slow down, to be patient, and to drive to the “unique conditions” of this highway.

“We’re working with the trucking industry, for example, to get to a zero accident point and working with the industry closely on making that safe,” he said.

“But in terms of opening up the restrictions that are in place to general travel, we can’t do that at this point in time.”