News release

The Safest Long Weekend in Years: BC Highway Patrol Releases Stats for High Risk Driving and Motorcycle Awareness Month

June 4, 2025 - British Columbia, British Columbia
From: BC Highway Patrol

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For the first time in at least six years, the Victoria Day long weekend did not have a single fatality on BC roads.*

Still, the high number of tickets shows that we all still have work to do to make BC highways safer as we look back on the High Risk Driving and Motorcycle Awareness Campaigns for May 2025.

“We had a lot of positive public feedback about the impact of BC Highway Patrol’s high-visibility enforcement, and we’re very happy to do our part to reduce deaths on our roads,” says Superintendent Mike Coyle of BC Highway Patrol. “We still find too many examples of irresponsible driving.”

Over the Victoria Day long weekend, BC Highway Patrol officers did the following education through enforcement**:

• Wrote over 1,900 speeding tickets province-wide;
• Impounded 79 vehicles due to excessive speeding.

Over the course of the month-long High Risk Driving and Motorcycle Awareness Campaigns in May, BC Highway Patrol wrote over 9,600 speeding tickets province-wide including:

• Central/Okanagan Region: Over 2,200 tickets (94 excessive speed with a vehicle impound);
• Vancouver Island: Over 1,500 tickets (53 excessive speed with a vehicle impound);
• Kootenay Region: Over 1,200 tickets (66 excessive speed with a vehicle impound);
• Northern Region: Over 1,900 tickets (68 excessive speed with a vehicle impound);
• South Coast/Lower Mainland: Over 2,500 tickets (122 excessive speed with a vehicle impound).

Some BC Highway Patrol enforcement stories include:

• On May 17, a driver on Highway 3/95 in the East Kootenays was stopped doing 166 km/h in a 100 zone. The driver was also impaired, and received a 90-day Immediate Roadside Prohibition, an excessive speed ticket, and had their vehicle impounded for seven days;
• On May 18, a driver blew a “warn” on an Approved Screening Device (ASD) on Highway 21 near Creston and received a three-day driving suspension. Her husband came to pick her but he did not pass the ASD and received a 24-hour suspension. Both were picked up by their parents;
• On the week of May 12, a Tesla Model S was stopped doing 191 km/h in a 100 zone on Highway #1 near Golden. This was the 24-year-old Alberta driver’s third excessive speed ticket in two years. He received a five-month driving prohibition, an excessive speeding ticket ($483), a 7-day minimum impound, and a notice to the Government of Alberta for a licence suspension there;
• On May 19, a motorcycle was recorded doing 152 km/h in a 90 zone on Highway #1 in Burnaby. The Class 8 (Learner) was driving contrary to restrictions. He was ticketed for $673 in fines, billed for the tow, and paid the cost of the seven day impound.

With the Summer Impaired Driving Campaign right around the corner, Superintendent Coyle has a message for everyone getting behind the wheel: “Refocus and take safe driving more seriously. The heat of summer will bring a lot more traffic on BC Highways.”

*There were three deaths over the May long weekend in 2024, and there were an average of four deaths between 2019 and 2023.

**Based on BC Highway Patrol statistics collected as of June 3, 2025.

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