The border closure between Victoria and New South Wales came into effect overnight, as the Covid-19 cluster linked to a Melbourne restaurant rises to 10.
At the stroke of midnight, police vehicles joined the ends of queues at each border checkpoint to mark the midnight closure. Travellers were told earlier on Friday they would need to be in line before 11:59pm in order to make it home.
"At midnight, regardless of how long the queue is, we'll have a police car go to the end of that queue," Victoria Police Deputy Commissioner Rick Nugent said earlier.
"If you are there by midnight, regardless of whether you're actually processed, you're included as arriving prior to midnight."
Travellers are no longer allowed to cross the NSW border into Victoria unless they have an exemption or a permit as a traveller from a separate state like Queensland or the ACT who solely travelled through NSW to reach Victoria.
Victorian authorities yesterday said people arriving after that time would have to enter mandatory hotel quarantine, but today clarified that was an option that would only be extended in exceptional circumstances, and most people would simply be turned back.
"We did not design the hotel quarantine system to enable people who went on holiday in NSW to come back a bit later," Victoria's Covid-19 response commander Jeroen Weimar said.