Smith County Commute Time Map & Patterns

Commute Time Burden in Smith County: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Smith County spend about 17 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 72 hours, about 3.0 full days, spent commuting. That is 50% less time on the road than the Kansas average of 17.2 minutes each way, a difference of 8.6 minutes.

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

Working from home just 2 days a week in Smith County would save about 29 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $888 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)
Smith County	8.6 min	17.2 min	72 hrs/yr	$2,221	154
Kansas	17.2 min	34.4 min	143 hrs/yr	$4,448	662
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: Kansas Counties

Compare commute times among different counties

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On average, it takes 8.6 minutes to get to work in Smith County. That's 62% shorter than the 22.4-minute U.S. average.

Faster than 87% of counties in Kansas

The most common departure window is 07:30 AM – 07:59 AM, followed by 07:00 AM – 07:29 AM. Driving is the most common commute choice, followed by walking. About 3.9% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Smith County

• Car: 88.2%
• Walked: 5.8%
• Worked at Home: 3.9% unusually low
• Other: 1.6%
• Public Transportation: 0.4%
• Motorcycle: < 0.1% unusually low
• Taxi: < 0.1% unusually low
• Bicycle: < 0.1% unusually low

Riding a motorcycle is essentially absent in Smith County, versus 0.1% in Kansas.

Taking a taxi is essentially absent in Smith County, versus 0.2% in Kansas.

Working from home is unusually rare in Smith County: 3.0 times less than the Kansas average (3.9% vs 11.8%).

Biking is essentially absent in Smith County, versus 0.3% in Kansas.

Commute Mode Trends in Smith County, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Smith 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
• Walked
• Worked at Home
• Other
• Public Transportation
• Taxi
• Motorcycle
• Bicycle

Show commute mode data by year

Year	Car	Walked	Worked at Home	Other	Public Transportation	Taxi	Motorcycle	Bicycle
2009	84.3%	5.9%	7.3%	2.3%	0.0%	0.0%	0.1%	0.1%
2010	82.3%	6.7%	8.5%	2.0%	0.0%	0.0%	0.3%	0.2%
2011	83.4%	5.8%	8.9%	1.6%	0.0%	0.0%	0.2%	0.2%
2012	83.7%	7.0%	7.5%	1.2%	0.0%	0.0%	0.6%	0.0%
2013	81.6%	8.4%	8.7%	0.7%	0.0%	0.0%	0.5%	0.0%
2014	83.8%	6.5%	8.6%	0.4%	0.0%	0.0%	0.7%	0.0%
2015	84.8%	6.6%	7.6%	0.4%	0.0%	0.0%	0.6%	0.0%
2016	82.0%	7.8%	9.0%	0.5%	0.0%	0.0%	0.7%	0.0%
2017	81.2%	7.6%	10.4%	0.4%	0.0%	0.0%	0.4%	0.0%
2018	85.4%	7.7%	6.2%	0.4%	0.0%	0.0%	0.3%	0.0%
2019	88.5%	6.0%	5.4%	0.0%	0.1%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2020	89.9%	4.3%	5.2%	0.4%	0.1%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2021	88.2%	4.6%	6.4%	0.7%	0.1%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2022	89.4%	4.3%	4.5%	1.5%	0.2%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2023	89.9%	3.6%	4.4%	1.6%	0.5%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2024	88.2%	5.8%	3.9%	1.6%	0.4%	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 2020 at 89.9% and lowest in 2017 at 81.2%. Overall it rose from 84.3% in 2009 to 88.2% in 2024, up 3.9 percentage points. It has fallen in the latest release.

Working from home lost the most ground, falling from 7.3% to 3.9% of workers (down 3.4 percentage points).

Walking overtook working from home to become the 2nd most common choice in the 2024 release and has stayed ahead since.

Walking peaked at 8.4% in 2013 and has since fallen back to 5.8%.

Commute Start Times in Smith County

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Smith County?

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

12:00-4:59 AM	12:00-4:59 AM Smith County2.9% Kansas4.7%	2.9%
5:00-5:29 AM	5:00-5:29 AM Smith County1.3% Kansas3.5%	1.3%
5:30-5:59 AM	5:30-5:59 AM Smith County4.8% Kansas5.2%	4.8%
6:00-6:29 AM	6:00-6:29 AM Smith County3.1% Kansas7.6%	3.1%
6:30-6:59 AM	6:30-6:59 AM Smith County7.7% Kansas10.3%	7.7%
7:00-7:29 AM	7:00-7:29 AM Smith County15.8% Kansas14.9%	15.8%
7:30-7:59 AM	7:30-7:59 AM Smith County31.9% Kansas16.8%	31.9%
8:00-8:29 AM	8:00-8:29 AM Smith County14.8% Kansas10.4%	14.8%
8:30-8:59 AM	8:30-8:59 AM Smith County4.6% Kansas4.5%	4.6%
9:00-9:59 AM	9:00-9:59 AM Smith County5.0% Kansas5.0%	5.0%
10:00-10:59 AM	10:00-10:59 AM Smith County0.7% Kansas2.5%	0.7%
11:00-11:59 AM	11:00-11:59 AM Smith County0.2% Kansas1.1%	0.2%
12:00-3:59 PM	12:00-3:59 PM Smith County4.3% Kansas7.0%	4.3%
4:00-11:59 PM	4:00-11:59 PM Smith County3.0% Kansas6.6%	3.0%

Smith County Kansas Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Smith County is 7:30-7:59 AM, when 31.9% of commuters leave home, compared with 16.8% across Kansas. Early starts are less common than in Kansas: 9.0% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 13.5% there. The morning rush is more concentrated than in Kansas: 70.2% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 52.3% there. About 1 in 8 commuters (13.2%) 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 Smith 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 Smith 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 Smith County next to Kansas 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.

• Smith County
• Kansas
• United States

Show typical departure times by year

Year	Smith County	Kansas	United States
2009	7:45 AM	7:39 AM	7:37 AM
2010	7:47 AM	7:38 AM	7:38 AM
2011	7:46 AM	7:38 AM	7:38 AM
2012	7:44 AM	7:38 AM	7:38 AM
2013	7:42 AM	7:38 AM	7:39 AM
2014	7:39 AM	7:38 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:43 AM	7:38 AM	7:38 AM
2016	7:45 AM	7:38 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:46 AM	7:38 AM	7:38 AM
2018	7:46 AM	7:37 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:46 AM	7:37 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:40 AM	7:37 AM	7:37 AM
2021	7:40 AM	7:37 AM	7:37 AM
2022	7:40 AM	7:37 AM	7:37 AM
2023	7:43 AM	7:37 AM	7:38 AM
2024	7:44 AM	7:37 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Smith County were on the road by 7:44 AM, 1 minute earlier than in 2009 (7:45 AM). Kansas followed the same path, with the typical start moving 2 minutes earlier. Commuters in Smith County now leave 6 minutes later than the typical American commuter (7:38 AM). Since the 2019 release, which covers the years just before the pandemic, the typical start in Smith County has moved 2 minutes earlier.

How does Smith County's commute time compare?

Metric	Smith County	Kansas	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	8.6 min	17.2 min	22.4 min
Departure Window	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM
Secondary Departure Window	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM
Work From Home	3.9%	11.8%	15.0%
Walked	5.8%	2.3%	2.4%
Public Transit	0.4%	0.4%	3.2%

The average commute time in Smith County is 8.6 minutes, shorter than the 17.2 minutes in Kansas.

The share of commuters using public transit is about the same as Kansas. 5.8% commute by walking, higher than the 2.3% in Kansas.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau