Ann Arbor Commute Time Map & Patterns

Commute Time Burden in Ann Arbor: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Ann Arbor spend about 35 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 146 hours, about 6.1 full days, spent commuting. That is 18% less time on the road than the Michigan average of 21.3 minutes each way, a difference of 3.8 minutes.

Ann Arbor holds about 1.2% of Michigan's population but accounts for roughly 1.0% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in Ann Arbor would save about 59 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $1,814 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)
Ann Arbor	17.6 min	35.1 min	146 hrs/yr	$4,534	2,902
Michigan	21.3 min	42.6 min	178 hrs/yr	$5,509	1,585
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.

Ann Arbor Commute Map

On average, it takes 17.6 minutes to get to work in Ann Arbor. That's 22% shorter than the 22.4-minute U.S. average.

The most common departure window is 09:00 AM – 09:59 AM, followed by 07:30 AM – 07:59 AM. Driving is the most common commute choice, followed by working from home. About 28.7% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Ann Arbor

• Car: 48.1% unusually low
• Worked at Home: 28.7%
• Walked: 13.2% unusually high
• Public Transportation: 7.2% unusually high
• Bicycle: 2.1% unusually high
• Other: 0.7%
• Taxi: < 0.1%
• Motorcycle: < 0.1% unusually low

Riding a motorcycle is unusually rare in Ann Arbor: 4.4 times less than the Michigan average (0.0% vs 0.1%).

Driving is 42% less common in Ann Arbor than the Michigan average (48.1% vs 82.2%).

Walking is unusually common in Ann Arbor: 6.6 times more than the Michigan average (13.2% vs 2.0%).

Public transit is unusually common in Ann Arbor: 7.7 times more than the Michigan average (7.2% vs 0.9%).

Biking is unusually common in Ann Arbor: 6.3 times more than the Michigan average (2.1% vs 0.3%).

Ann Arbor stands out for active commuting: 15.3% of workers walk or bike to work, 6.6 times the Michigan average of 2.3%.

Commute Mode Trends in Ann Arbor, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Ann Arbor 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
• Bicycle
• Other
• Taxi
• Motorcycle

Show commute mode data by year

Year	Car	Worked at Home	Walked	Public Transportation	Bicycle	Other	Taxi	Motorcycle
2009	64.7%	5.9%	16.3%	8.8%	3.7%	0.3%	0.2%	0.2%
2010	64.7%	6.1%	16.0%	8.9%	3.6%	0.3%	0.1%	0.3%
2011	64.6%	5.6%	16.2%	9.5%	3.5%	0.2%	0.1%	0.2%
2012	64.1%	5.7%	16.1%	9.9%	3.8%	0.2%	0.1%	0.2%
2013	63.7%	5.8%	15.6%	10.0%	4.3%	0.3%	0.1%	0.2%
2014	63.2%	6.1%	15.3%	10.2%	4.6%	0.2%	0.2%	0.2%
2015	61.6%	6.8%	14.9%	11.1%	4.8%	0.3%	0.2%	0.1%
2016	61.0%	7.3%	15.3%	11.0%	4.6%	0.5%	0.2%	0.1%
2017	60.3%	7.5%	15.9%	11.0%	4.5%	0.5%	0.2%	0.1%
2018	59.1%	7.9%	17.2%	10.8%	4.3%	0.4%	0.2%	0.2%
2019	59.5%	8.2%	17.2%	10.6%	3.9%	0.4%	0.2%	0.1%
2020	56.7%	12.4%	17.3%	9.4%	3.5%	0.5%	0.1%	0.1%
2021	53.2%	19.2%	15.7%	8.1%	3.2%	0.4%	0.2%	0.0%
2022	51.2%	23.3%	14.8%	7.5%	2.7%	0.4%	0.1%	0.0%
2023	50.4%	26.3%	13.2%	7.3%	2.4%	0.5%	0.0%	0.0%
2024	48.1%	28.7%	13.2%	7.2%	2.1%	0.7%	0.1%	0.0%

Driving was the most common way to get to work in every release from 2009 to 2024. Overall its share fell from 64.7% in 2009 to 48.1% in 2024, down 16.6 percentage points. It has fallen in each of the last 5 releases.

Working from home gained the most ground in Ann Arbor: its share of workers rose from 5.9% in 2009 to 28.7% in 2024, up 22.8 percentage points. Most of that increase, 20.5 points, came in the releases after 2019, which include the pandemic years.

Walking lost the most ground, falling from 16.3% to 13.2% of workers (down 3.1 percentage points).

Working from home overtook walking to become the 2nd most common choice in the 2021 release and has stayed ahead since.

Public transit peaked at 11.1% in 2015 and has since fallen back to 7.2%.

Commute Start Times in Ann Arbor

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Ann Arbor?

The bars show when commuters in Ann Arbor 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 Michigan for comparison. Hover over or tap a row for the exact numbers.

12:00-4:59 AM	12:00-4:59 AM Ann Arbor0.9% Michigan5.3%	0.9%
5:00-5:29 AM	5:00-5:29 AM Ann Arbor1.5% Michigan3.9%	1.5%
5:30-5:59 AM	5:30-5:59 AM Ann Arbor1.7% Michigan5.1%	1.7%
6:00-6:29 AM	6:00-6:29 AM Ann Arbor3.1% Michigan8.0%	3.1%
6:30-6:59 AM	6:30-6:59 AM Ann Arbor4.2% Michigan9.0%	4.2%
7:00-7:29 AM	7:00-7:29 AM Ann Arbor8.6% Michigan13.0%	8.6%
7:30-7:59 AM	7:30-7:59 AM Ann Arbor13.3% Michigan12.1%	13.3%
8:00-8:29 AM	8:00-8:29 AM Ann Arbor12.9% Michigan10.9%	12.9%
8:30-8:59 AM	8:30-8:59 AM Ann Arbor11.1% Michigan5.6%	11.1%
9:00-9:59 AM	9:00-9:59 AM Ann Arbor14.6% Michigan6.7%	14.6%
10:00-10:59 AM	10:00-10:59 AM Ann Arbor6.6% Michigan3.2%	6.6%
11:00-11:59 AM	11:00-11:59 AM Ann Arbor3.6% Michigan1.6%	3.6%
12:00-3:59 PM	12:00-3:59 PM Ann Arbor11.9% Michigan8.5%	11.9%
4:00-11:59 PM	4:00-11:59 PM Ann Arbor6.0% Michigan7.1%	6.0%

Ann Arbor Michigan Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Ann Arbor is 9:00-9:59 AM, when 14.6% of commuters leave home, compared with 6.7% across Michigan. Early starts are less common than in Michigan: 4.1% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 14.3% there. The morning rush is more spread out than in Michigan: 39.0% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 45.0% there. About 1 in 2 commuters (42.7%) 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 Ann Arbor, 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 Ann Arbor 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 Ann Arbor next to Michigan 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.

• Ann Arbor
• Michigan
• United States

Show typical departure times by year

Year	Ann Arbor	Michigan	United States
2009	8:34 AM	7:44 AM	7:37 AM
2010	8:33 AM	7:45 AM	7:38 AM
2011	8:33 AM	7:45 AM	7:38 AM
2012	8:32 AM	7:45 AM	7:38 AM
2013	8:32 AM	7:45 AM	7:39 AM
2014	8:32 AM	7:45 AM	7:39 AM
2015	8:32 AM	7:44 AM	7:38 AM
2016	8:32 AM	7:44 AM	7:38 AM
2017	8:28 AM	7:43 AM	7:38 AM
2018	8:29 AM	7:43 AM	7:37 AM
2019	8:28 AM	7:42 AM	7:37 AM
2020	8:31 AM	7:42 AM	7:37 AM
2021	8:32 AM	7:42 AM	7:37 AM
2022	8:35 AM	7:43 AM	7:37 AM
2023	8:37 AM	7:43 AM	7:38 AM
2024	8:40 AM	7:44 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Ann Arbor were on the road by 8:40 AM, 6 minutes later than in 2009 (8:34 AM). Across Michigan, the typical start barely moved over the same years. Commuters in Ann Arbor now leave 62 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 Ann Arbor has moved 12 minutes later. The 2024 release is the latest typical start for Ann Arbor in the whole series.

How does Ann Arbor's commute time compare?

Metric	Ann Arbor	Michigan	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	17.6 min	21.3 min	22.4 min
Departure Window	09:00 AM – 09:59 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	28.7%	13.5%	15.0%
Walked	13.2%	2.0%	2.4%
Public Transit	7.2%	0.9%	3.2%

The average commute time in Ann Arbor is 17.6 minutes, shorter than the 21.3 minutes in Michigan.

7.2% commute by public transit, higher than the 0.9% in Michigan. 13.2% commute by walking, higher than the 2.0% in Michigan.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau