Impaired driving checkpoints do not always yield a high number of arrests.

There was a total of eight arrests made Friday night due to impaired driving by patrols operating the OVI checkpoint and patrolling the surrounding areas.

According to an Ohio State Highway Patrol media release, 331 vehicles drove through the checkpoint, two drivers underwent a sobriety test and one resulted in an arrest.

“The checkpoints are more of an educational perspective of making the public aware of the dangers of impaired driving,” Ohio State Highway Patrol Lieutenant Matt Boyd said.

The locations selected for the checkpoints are based upon OVI arrests in an area and impaired driving crashes within a certain radius.

“We may see 60 or 70 people a night where, if we go to the checkpoint, we’ll see four-to-five times that many people and actually get to share information with them about the dangers of impaired driving at the checkpoint,” Boyd said. “(It’s) more of a deterrence effect for people that may normally drive through the area impaired.”

In addition to the eight OVI related arrests, there were 62 traffic stops made by the saturation patrols in the areas around Northpointe Drive.

Between OSP, the Muskingum County Sheriff’s Department and the Zanesville Police Department, 16 law enforcement officers participated in the checkpoint or in patrolling the surrounding areas.

OVI checkpoints are funded through the Highway Traffic Safety Administration. The administration receives federal grants for states that participate in impaired driving countermeasures like OVI checkpoints.

“It was certainly worth the effort,” Boyd said. “You never know how many lives you saved by removing impaired drivers from the roadway.”