Clarke County Commute Time Map & Patterns

Commute Time Burden in Clarke County: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Clarke County spend about 27 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 112 hours, about 4.7 full days, spent commuting. That is 21% less time on the road than the Iowa average of 17.0 minutes each way, a difference of 3.5 minutes.

Clarke County holds about 0.3% of Iowa's population but accounts for roughly 0.2% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in Clarke County would save about 45 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $1,389 at the same national wage assumption used above.

Area	One-Way Commute	Daily Round-Trip	Yearly Time Spent	Estimated Yearly Cost	Local Road Traffic (VPD)
Clarke County	13.4 min	26.9 min	112 hrs/yr	$3,473	223
Iowa	17.0 min	33.9 min	141 hrs/yr	$4,382	606
United States	22.4 min	44.8 min	187 hrs/yr	$5,790	1,355

The estimated yearly cost applies a single national rule of thumb (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics average hourly earnings), not a measurement of wages in this area - treat it as a rough estimate, not a paycheck figure. Local road traffic counts, vehicles per day on non-highway roads, come from proprietary Ticon and TrafficZoom data.

Commute Time Map: Iowa Counties

Compare commute times among different counties

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On average, it takes 13.4 minutes to get to work in Clarke County. That's 40% shorter than the 22.4-minute U.S. average.

Faster than 80% of counties in Iowa

The most common departure window is 06:30 AM – 06:59 AM, followed by 06:00 AM – 06:29 AM. Driving is the most common commute choice, followed by working from home. About 8.9% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Clarke County

• Car: 89.6%
• Worked at Home: 8.9%
• Other: 1.0%
• Walked: 0.4% unusually low
• Public Transportation: < 0.1% unusually low
• Motorcycle: < 0.1% unusually low
• Taxi: < 0.1% unusually low
• Bicycle: < 0.1% unusually low

Riding a motorcycle is essentially absent in Clarke County, versus 0.1% in Iowa.

Walking is unusually rare in Clarke County: 7.3 times less than the Iowa average (0.4% vs 2.9%).

Public transit is unusually rare in Clarke County: 31.3 times less than the Iowa average (0.0% vs 0.7%).

Taking a taxi is essentially absent in Clarke County, versus 0.2% in Iowa.

Biking is essentially absent in Clarke County, versus 0.3% in Iowa.

Few people walk or bike to work in Clarke County: just 0.4%, 8.1 times below the Iowa average of 3.2%.

Commute Mode Trends in Clarke County, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Clarke County get to work, as a share of all workers aged 16 and over, across 16 U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey (ACS) releases from 2009 to 2024. Each release is a 5-year estimate: the 2024 figures cover surveys taken from 2020 to 2024. Because neighboring releases share most of their survey years, the lines move gradually, and a sudden change such as the rise of remote work in 2020 spreads across several releases. Hover over or tap a line to highlight it, and use the legend to show or hide a mode. Driving starts hidden so the smaller modes stay readable.

• Car
• Worked at Home
• Other
• Walked
• Public Transportation
• Taxi
• Motorcycle
• Bicycle

Show commute mode data by year

Year	Car	Worked at Home	Other	Walked	Public Transportation	Taxi	Motorcycle	Bicycle
2009	86.8%	8.8%	0.5%	3.7%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	0.2%
2010	87.3%	10.4%	0.3%	2.0%	0.1%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2011	86.2%	10.9%	0.1%	2.6%	0.1%	0.0%	0.1%	0.0%
2012	87.6%	8.1%	0.2%	3.2%	0.8%	0.0%	0.1%	0.0%
2013	91.5%	4.9%	0.2%	2.3%	0.9%	0.0%	0.1%	0.0%
2014	91.2%	4.7%	0.1%	3.1%	0.9%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2015	91.0%	4.2%	0.3%	3.6%	0.9%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2016	93.1%	2.9%	0.4%	2.8%	0.8%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2017	93.7%	3.2%	1.0%	1.7%	0.3%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2018	92.1%	4.0%	1.1%	2.3%	0.5%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2019	92.1%	3.2%	1.0%	3.2%	0.3%	0.0%	0.3%	0.0%
2020	91.6%	4.2%	0.8%	2.6%	0.4%	0.0%	0.3%	0.0%
2021	91.8%	4.4%	0.9%	2.1%	0.5%	0.0%	0.4%	0.0%
2022	87.7%	8.2%	0.4%	3.1%	0.2%	0.0%	0.3%	0.0%
2023	88.7%	8.0%	0.8%	2.1%	0.0%	0.0%	0.3%	0.0%
2024	89.6%	8.9%	1.0%	0.4%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%

Driving was the most common way to get to work in every release from 2009 to 2024. Its share was highest in 2017 at 93.7% and lowest in 2011 at 86.2%. Overall it rose from 86.8% in 2009 to 89.6% in 2024, up 2.8 percentage points. It has risen in each of the last 2 releases.

Walking lost the most ground, falling from 3.7% to 0.4% of workers (down 3.3 percentage points).

Working from home peaked at 10.9% in 2011 and has since fallen back to 8.9%.

Commute Start Times in Clarke County

• 🐦 Early BirdThe 2nd-earliest start among Iowa's 99 counties: half of commuters are on the road by 7:04 AM.
• 🧘 Rush-Hour DodgersThe 3rd-lowest share of rush-hour departures among Iowa's 99 counties: only 39.2% of commuters leave between 6:30 and 8:29 AM.

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Clarke County?

The bars show when commuters in Clarke County leave home for work, as a share of everyone who commutes (people who work from home are not counted), from the 2024 ACS 5-year estimates. The thin violet marks show Iowa for comparison. Hover over or tap a row for the exact numbers.

12:00-4:59 AM	12:00-4:59 AM Clarke County8.2% Iowa5.2%	8.2%
5:00-5:29 AM	5:00-5:29 AM Clarke County5.6% Iowa4.1%	5.6%
5:30-5:59 AM	5:30-5:59 AM Clarke County5.1% Iowa5.7%	5.1%
6:00-6:29 AM	6:00-6:29 AM Clarke County12.8% Iowa8.2%	12.8%
6:30-6:59 AM	6:30-6:59 AM Clarke County17.3% Iowa11.2%	17.3%
7:00-7:29 AM	7:00-7:29 AM Clarke County8.2% Iowa15.1%	8.2%
7:30-7:59 AM	7:30-7:59 AM Clarke County6.4% Iowa15.6%	6.4%
8:00-8:29 AM	8:00-8:29 AM Clarke County7.4% Iowa9.1%	7.4%
8:30-8:59 AM	8:30-8:59 AM Clarke County1.8% Iowa3.6%	1.8%
9:00-9:59 AM	9:00-9:59 AM Clarke County1.9% Iowa4.4%	1.9%
10:00-10:59 AM	10:00-10:59 AM Clarke County7.5% Iowa2.3%	7.5%
11:00-11:59 AM	11:00-11:59 AM Clarke County0.7% Iowa1.1%	0.7%
12:00-3:59 PM	12:00-3:59 PM Clarke County6.0% Iowa7.5%	6.0%
4:00-11:59 PM	4:00-11:59 PM Clarke County11.2% Iowa6.8%	11.2%

Clarke County Iowa Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Clarke County is 6:30-6:59 AM, when 17.3% of commuters leave home, compared with 11.2% across Iowa. Early starts are more common than in Iowa: 18.9% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 14.9% there. The morning rush is more spread out than in Iowa: 39.2% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 51.0% there. About 1 in 4 commuters (27.3%) leave at 9 AM or later, which usually points to shift work, flexible hours or part-time jobs.

When people leave matters as much as how far they go. Rush-hour traffic shrinks how much ground a 20-minute trip covers, so a trade area drawn as a simple circle often takes in neighborhoods that customers or staff would never drive from and misses others that are an easy trip. A drive-time zone, also called an isochrone, outlines every place within a set number of minutes of an address, which makes it the more honest way to size a store's catchment, a hiring area or the commute from a new home.

See it for yourself on the interactive map: click any spot in Clarke County, pick a 5, 10, 15 or 30-minute drive and see the local demographics of the people who live within that exact drive time.

Is Clarke County Waking Up Earlier? Typical Departure Time, 2009-2024

Each line follows the typical (median) departure time: the moment by which half of commuters have already left home. Higher on the chart means a later start. Setting Clarke County next to Iowa and the U.S. shows whether local mornings are drifting earlier or later than everyone else's. The figures span 16 ACS 5-year releases, so changes build up gradually rather than jumping from one year to the next.

• Clarke County
• Iowa
• United States

Show typical departure times by year

Year	Clarke County	Iowa	United States
2009	7:06 AM	7:35 AM	7:37 AM
2010	7:15 AM	7:34 AM	7:38 AM
2011	7:12 AM	7:35 AM	7:38 AM
2012	7:27 AM	7:34 AM	7:38 AM
2013	7:18 AM	7:34 AM	7:39 AM
2014	7:23 AM	7:33 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:24 AM	7:32 AM	7:38 AM
2016	7:21 AM	7:32 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:13 AM	7:32 AM	7:38 AM
2018	7:21 AM	7:31 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:15 AM	7:31 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:14 AM	7:31 AM	7:37 AM
2021	7:03 AM	7:31 AM	7:37 AM
2022	7:10 AM	7:31 AM	7:37 AM
2023	7:11 AM	7:31 AM	7:38 AM
2024	7:04 AM	7:31 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Clarke County were on the road by 7:04 AM, 2 minutes earlier than in 2009 (7:06 AM). Iowa followed the same path, with the typical start moving 3 minutes earlier. Commuters in Clarke County now leave 34 minutes earlier than the typical American commuter (7:38 AM). Since the 2019 release, which covers the years just before the pandemic, the typical start in Clarke County has moved 12 minutes earlier.

How does Clarke County's commute time compare?

Metric	Clarke County	Iowa	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	13.4 min	17.0 min	22.4 min
Departure Window	06:30 AM – 06:59 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM
Secondary Departure Window	06:00 AM – 06:29 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM
Work From Home	8.9%	11.3%	15.0%
Walked	0.4%	2.9%	2.4%
Public Transit	< 0.1%	0.7%	3.2%

The average commute time in Clarke County is 13.4 minutes, shorter than the 17.0 minutes in Iowa.

0.0% commute by public transit, lower than the 0.7% in Iowa. 0.4% commute by walking, lower than the 2.9% in Iowa.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau