Saco Commute Time Map & Patterns

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Commuting in Saco, Maine: how long it takes, when people leave home and how they get to work. Ask Map AI about any address.

You 9/24/26, 4:00 PM

How long is the round-trip commute in Saco?

Map AI 9/24/26, 4:00 PM

Commute Time Burden in Saco: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Saco spend about 45 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 189 hours, about 7.9 full days, spent commuting. That is 9% more time on the road than the Maine average of 20.8 minutes each way, a difference of 1.9 minutes.

Saco holds about 1.5% of Maine's population but accounts for roughly 1.6% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in Saco would save about 76 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $2,344 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)
Saco	22.7 min	45.4 min	189 hrs/yr	$5,860	2,576
Maine	20.8 min	41.6 min	173 hrs/yr	$5,372	1,015
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.

Saco Commute Map

On average, it takes 22.7 minutes to get to work in Saco. That's 1% longer than the 22.4-minute U.S. average.

The most common departure window is 07:00 AM – 07:29 AM, followed by 07:30 AM – 07:59 AM. Driving is the most common commute choice, followed by working from home. About 19.0% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Saco

Riding a motorcycle is essentially absent in Saco, versus 0.1% in Maine.

Taking a taxi is essentially absent in Saco, versus 0.2% in Maine.

Commute Mode Trends in Saco, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Saco 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.

Share of workers aged 16 and over, by ACS 5-year release year. Source: U.S. Census Bureau.

Show commute mode data by year

Year	Car	Worked at Home	Walked	Bicycle	Public Transportation	Other	Taxi	Motorcycle
2009	90.3%	5.6%	2.3%	0.1%	0.7%	1.1%	0.0%	0.0%
2010	91.6%	5.2%	1.8%	0.1%	0.8%	0.6%	0.0%	0.0%
2011	93.0%	3.8%	1.9%	0.1%	0.7%	0.4%	0.0%	0.0%
2012	90.9%	4.4%	2.7%	0.1%	1.3%	0.4%	0.0%	0.2%
2013	90.7%	4.6%	3.1%	0.0%	1.2%	0.3%	0.0%	0.1%
2014	93.3%	3.9%	1.4%	0.0%	1.1%	0.2%	0.0%	0.1%
2015	92.5%	4.1%	1.8%	0.1%	1.1%	0.2%	0.1%	0.1%
2016	93.2%	3.7%	1.5%	0.3%	1.0%	0.3%	0.1%	0.1%
2017	93.6%	3.4%	1.4%	0.4%	0.2%	0.8%	0.1%	0.2%
2018	93.0%	3.7%	1.4%	0.6%	0.2%	0.7%	0.1%	0.2%
2019	92.8%	3.8%	1.4%	0.4%	0.4%	0.8%	0.1%	0.2%
2020	90.7%	7.4%	0.9%	0.1%	0.3%	0.5%	0.0%	0.1%
2021	87.2%	9.6%	1.7%	0.4%	0.3%	0.6%	0.0%	0.1%
2022	85.6%	11.6%	1.3%	0.5%	0.4%	0.6%	0.0%	0.0%
2023	80.6%	15.7%	1.5%	0.8%	0.8%	0.7%	0.0%	0.0%
2024	77.4%	19.0%	1.4%	0.9%	0.8%	0.5%	0.0%	0.0%

Driving was the most common way to get to work in every release from 2009 to 2024. Its share peaked in 2017 at 93.6%. Overall it fell from 90.3% in 2009 to 77.4% in 2024, down 12.9 percentage points. It has fallen in each of the last 7 releases.

Working from home gained the most ground in Saco: its share of workers rose from 5.6% in 2009 to 19.0% in 2024, up 13.4 percentage points. Most of that increase, 15.2 points, came in the releases after 2019, which include the pandemic years.

Walking lost the most ground, falling from 2.3% to 1.4% of workers (down 0.9 percentage points).

Commute Start Times in Saco

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Saco?

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

12:00-4:59 AM		2.9%
5:00-5:29 AM		6.5%
5:30-5:59 AM		4.5%
6:00-6:29 AM		6.2%
6:30-6:59 AM		10.8%
7:00-7:29 AM		17.9%
7:30-7:59 AM		13.5%
8:00-8:29 AM		9.8%
8:30-8:59 AM		9.7%
9:00-9:59 AM		6.6%
10:00-10:59 AM		2.8%
11:00-11:59 AM		2.1%
12:00-3:59 PM		4.8%
4:00-11:59 PM		2.1%

Saco Maine Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Saco is 7:00-7:29 AM, when 17.9% of commuters leave home, compared with 15.8% across Maine. Early starts are less common than in Maine: 13.8% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 16.0% there. The morning rush is more concentrated than in Maine: 52.0% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 49.9% there. About 1 in 5 commuters (18.3%) 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 Saco, 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 Saco 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 Saco next to Maine 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.

Median time commuters leave home, by ACS 5-year release year. Source: U.S. Census Bureau.

Show typical departure times by year

Year	Saco	Maine	United States
2009	7:37 AM	7:26 AM	7:37 AM
2010	7:33 AM	7:26 AM	7:38 AM
2011	7:38 AM	7:27 AM	7:38 AM
2012	7:36 AM	7:27 AM	7:38 AM
2013	7:37 AM	7:27 AM	7:39 AM
2014	7:37 AM	7:27 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:42 AM	7:26 AM	7:38 AM
2016	7:39 AM	7:26 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:41 AM	7:25 AM	7:38 AM
2018	7:42 AM	7:24 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:36 AM	7:24 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:35 AM	7:24 AM	7:37 AM
2021	7:34 AM	7:24 AM	7:37 AM
2022	7:37 AM	7:24 AM	7:37 AM
2023	7:33 AM	7:25 AM	7:38 AM
2024	7:33 AM	7:25 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Saco were on the road by 7:33 AM, 4 minutes earlier than in 2009 (7:37 AM). The shift is sharper than across Maine, where the typical start moved 1 minute earlier. Commuters in Saco now leave 5 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 Saco has moved 3 minutes earlier.

How does Saco's commute time compare?

Metric	Saco	Maine	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	22.7 min	20.8 min	22.4 min
Departure Window	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM
Secondary Departure Window	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM
Work From Home	19.0%	15.9%	15.0%
Walked	1.4%	3.4%	2.4%
Public Transit	0.8%	0.5%	3.2%

The average commute time in Saco is 22.7 minutes, longer than the 20.8 minutes in Maine.

0.8% commute by public transit, higher than the 0.5% in Maine. 1.4% commute by walking, lower than the 3.4% in Maine.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau

Saco, ME Commute Compared With Nearby Cities

How Saco, ME compares with the 1 cities closest to it.

Area	Population	One-way commute	Work from home	Typical departure
Saco, ME	20,819	22.7 min #2/2	19.0% #1/2	7:33 AM #2/2
Biddeford, ME	22,492	21.3 min	14.2%	7:32 AM

Frequently Asked Questions

Common questions about commuting in Saco, Maine.

Is living in Saco, Maine good for avoiding long commute costs?

Commuters here spend an estimated 189 hours a year on the road, worth roughly $5,860 at a typical national wage. That's 9% more than the typical Maine commuter spends.

When is peak congestion during the morning commute in Saco, Maine?

Traffic peaks between 07:00 AM – 07:29 AM in Saco, Maine. Leaving before or after this window is the single easiest way to avoid the heaviest local congestion, though 07:30 AM – 07:59 AM also sees a secondary bump.