Roads across the nation are already seeing heavy congestion on Friday, a day before the start of the long lunar New Year holidays. 

According to the Korea Expressway Corporation, some five-and-a-half million vehicles are set to hit highways on Friday. 

The agency forecast around 470-thousand vehicles will travel from the Seoul metro area to the provinces and some 440-thousand vehicles will move from the provinces to Seoul and its surrounding areas. 

Friday's traffic from the Seoul metro area to the provinces is expected to peak between five and six p.m. and ease from ten to eleven p.m. 

The traffic jam on the way back to the capital is set to peak around five and six p.m. and ease between nine and ten p.m.