Hamilton County Commute Time Map & Patterns

Commute Time Burden in Hamilton County: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Hamilton County spend about 52 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 215 hours, about 9.0 full days, spent commuting. That is 9% more time on the road than the Illinois average of 23.6 minutes each way, a difference of 2.2 minutes.

Hamilton County holds about 0.1% of Illinois's population and accounts for roughly 0.1% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in Hamilton County would save about 86 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $2,667 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)
Hamilton County	25.8 min	51.6 min	215 hrs/yr	$6,667	582
Illinois	23.6 min	47.3 min	197 hrs/yr	$6,104	1,547
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: Illinois Counties

Compare commute times among different counties

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On average, it takes 25.8 minutes to get to work in Hamilton County. That's 15% longer than the 22.4-minute U.S. average.

Slower than 87% of counties in Illinois

The most common departure window is 07:30 AM – 07:59 AM, followed by 06:00 AM – 06:29 AM. Driving is the most common commute choice, followed by working from home. About 2.4% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Hamilton County

• Car: 95.8% unusually high
• Worked at Home: 2.4% unusually low
• Walked: 0.9% unusually low
• Public Transportation: 0.6% unusually low
• Other: 0.3%
• Motorcycle: < 0.1% unusually low
• Taxi: < 0.1% unusually low
• Bicycle: < 0.1% unusually low

Riding a motorcycle is essentially absent in Hamilton County, versus 0.1% in Illinois.

Driving is 30% more common in Hamilton County than the Illinois average (95.8% vs 73.7%).

Walking is unusually rare in Hamilton County: 3.1 times less than the Illinois average (0.9% vs 2.8%).

Public transit is unusually rare in Hamilton County: 9.5 times less than the Illinois average (0.6% vs 5.8%).

Taking a taxi is essentially absent in Hamilton County, versus 0.3% in Illinois.

Working from home is unusually rare in Hamilton County: 6.7 times less than the Illinois average (2.4% vs 15.9%).

Biking is essentially absent in Hamilton County, versus 0.5% in Illinois.

Few people walk or bike to work in Hamilton County: just 0.9%, 3.8 times below the Illinois average of 3.3%.

Commute Mode Trends in Hamilton County, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Hamilton 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
• Walked
• Public Transportation
• Other
• Taxi
• Motorcycle
• Bicycle

Show commute mode data by year

Year	Car	Worked at Home	Walked	Public Transportation	Other	Taxi	Motorcycle	Bicycle
2009	93.3%	5.1%	0.4%	0.0%	1.2%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2010	92.3%	6.4%	0.9%	0.0%	0.4%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2011	93.4%	5.3%	1.0%	0.2%	0.0%	0.0%	0.1%	0.0%
2012	92.1%	6.8%	0.9%	0.2%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2013	93.2%	5.5%	1.0%	0.3%	0.0%	0.0%	0.1%	0.0%
2014	93.9%	4.7%	0.9%	0.3%	0.0%	0.0%	0.1%	0.0%
2015	92.8%	4.3%	0.8%	1.9%	0.3%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2016	92.1%	4.3%	1.2%	1.7%	0.4%	0.0%	0.0%	0.3%
2017	91.2%	4.2%	1.9%	1.9%	0.5%	0.0%	0.0%	0.3%
2018	89.2%	7.1%	2.0%	1.2%	0.4%	0.0%	0.0%	0.1%
2019	86.5%	8.4%	2.9%	1.5%	0.6%	0.0%	0.0%	0.1%
2020	88.3%	7.9%	1.8%	0.3%	0.6%	0.0%	0.0%	1.1%
2021	90.6%	7.3%	1.5%	0.3%	0.2%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2022	90.2%	6.4%	2.7%	0.4%	0.4%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2023	93.2%	3.4%	2.6%	0.4%	0.4%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2024	95.8%	2.4%	0.9%	0.6%	0.3%	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 bottomed out in 2019 at 86.5%. Overall it rose from 93.3% in 2009 to 95.8% in 2024, up 2.5 percentage points. It has risen in each of the last 2 releases.

Public transit gained the most ground in Hamilton County: its share of workers rose from 0.0% in 2009 to 0.6% in 2024, up 0.6 percentage points.

Working from home lost the most ground, falling from 5.1% to 2.4% of workers (down 2.7 percentage points).

Walking peaked at 2.9% in 2019 and has since fallen back to 0.9%.

Commute Start Times in Hamilton County

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Hamilton County?

The bars show when commuters in Hamilton 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 Illinois for comparison. Hover over or tap a row for the exact numbers.

12:00-4:59 AM	12:00-4:59 AM Hamilton County7.3% Illinois5.6%	7.3%
5:00-5:29 AM	5:00-5:29 AM Hamilton County9.2% Illinois4.3%	9.2%
5:30-5:59 AM	5:30-5:59 AM Hamilton County7.6% Illinois4.9%	7.6%
6:00-6:29 AM	6:00-6:29 AM Hamilton County11.6% Illinois9.0%	11.6%
6:30-6:59 AM	6:30-6:59 AM Hamilton County8.1% Illinois9.4%	8.1%
7:00-7:29 AM	7:00-7:29 AM Hamilton County8.3% Illinois14.3%	8.3%
7:30-7:59 AM	7:30-7:59 AM Hamilton County17.4% Illinois11.6%	17.4%
8:00-8:29 AM	8:00-8:29 AM Hamilton County6.8% Illinois11.2%	6.8%
8:30-8:59 AM	8:30-8:59 AM Hamilton County4.1% Illinois5.2%	4.1%
9:00-9:59 AM	9:00-9:59 AM Hamilton County4.6% Illinois6.1%	4.6%
10:00-10:59 AM	10:00-10:59 AM Hamilton County0.8% Illinois2.9%	0.8%
11:00-11:59 AM	11:00-11:59 AM Hamilton County0.3% Illinois1.5%	0.3%
12:00-3:59 PM	12:00-3:59 PM Hamilton County8.3% Illinois7.7%	8.3%
4:00-11:59 PM	4:00-11:59 PM Hamilton County5.6% Illinois6.3%	5.6%

Hamilton County Illinois Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Hamilton County is 7:30-7:59 AM, when 17.4% of commuters leave home, compared with 11.6% across Illinois. Early starts are more common than in Illinois: 24.1% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 14.8% there. The morning rush is more spread out than in Illinois: 40.6% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 46.5% there. About 1 in 5 commuters (19.6%) 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 Hamilton 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 Hamilton 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 Hamilton County next to Illinois 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.

• Hamilton County
• Illinois
• United States

Show typical departure times by year

Year	Hamilton County	Illinois	United States
2009	7:22 AM	7:35 AM	7:37 AM
2010	7:22 AM	7:35 AM	7:38 AM
2011	7:30 AM	7:36 AM	7:38 AM
2012	7:34 AM	7:36 AM	7:38 AM
2013	7:25 AM	7:36 AM	7:39 AM
2014	7:27 AM	7:36 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:24 AM	7:35 AM	7:38 AM
2016	7:24 AM	7:35 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:21 AM	7:35 AM	7:38 AM
2018	7:21 AM	7:35 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:29 AM	7:35 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:22 AM	7:35 AM	7:37 AM
2021	7:18 AM	7:35 AM	7:37 AM
2022	7:14 AM	7:35 AM	7:37 AM
2023	7:30 AM	7:36 AM	7:38 AM
2024	7:22 AM	7:36 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Hamilton County were on the road by 7:22 AM, almost exactly the same as in 2009. Across Illinois, meanwhile, the typical commuter now leaves 1 minute later than in 2009. Commuters in Hamilton County now leave 16 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 Hamilton County has moved 7 minutes earlier.

How does Hamilton County's commute time compare?

Metric	Hamilton County	Illinois	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	25.8 min	23.6 min	22.4 min
Departure Window	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM
Secondary Departure Window	06:00 AM – 06:29 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM
Work From Home	2.4%	15.9%	15.0%
Walked	0.9%	2.8%	2.4%
Public Transit	0.6%	5.8%	3.2%

The average commute time in Hamilton County is 25.8 minutes, longer than the 23.6 minutes in Illinois.

0.6% commute by public transit, lower than the 5.8% in Illinois. 0.9% commute by walking, lower than the 2.8% in Illinois.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau