Tour bus companies are searching for a short-term overnight parking solution as a blockade threat continues to hang over Queenstown.
A dispute between drivers, their employers, hotels and the Queenstown Lakes District Council over a claimed lack of parking for buses threatened to flare up again on Friday.
DowntownQT town centre manager Steve Wilde told the Otago Daily Times he called the police after hearing some renegade drivers were planning a blockade in the resort's central business district that evening.
Although it did not eventuate, he alerted police after becoming concerned the threat was "reasonably serious''.
Last week the drivers' spokesman, Rod Griffiths, agreed to hold back on a threat to bring "chaos'' to the CBD until the parking issue was fixed.
Mr Griffiths claims up to 100 drivers are prepared to hold a blockade of key resort streets out of frustration about a shortage of overnight bus parks at hotels and a council clampdown on buses parking on streets surrounding the CBD.
He told the ODT on Friday he was relieved the drivers had pulled back on a "go-slow'' action.
Mr Wilde said tour coach company managers aligned with the Bus and Coach Association and Queenstown-based operators had assured him their drivers would not support a blockade.
Despite a "handful of independent drivers upping the rhetoric'', he doubted a mass blockade would go ahead.
"In the end, you're not going to get 100 drivers who are going to put their jobs on the line. We are working on a solution, and we hope to get something sorted in the next couple of days.''
The association was looking at leasing land for two months to tide the drivers over during the resort's peak tourism months, but had yet to find a suitable site.
Council-owned land in Lakeview - above the resort's CBD - was a fallback option but the onus was on tour coach companies to find an affordable site, he said.
Bus and Coach Association chief executive Barry Kidd could not be reached for comment.
