Norton Shores Commute Time Map & Patterns

Commute Time Burden in Norton Shores: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Norton Shores spend about 33 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 137 hours, about 5.7 full days, spent commuting. That is 23% less time on the road than the Michigan average of 21.3 minutes each way, a difference of 4.9 minutes.

Norton Shores holds about 0.2% of Michigan's population and accounts for roughly 0.2% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in Norton Shores would save about 55 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $1,700 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)
Norton Shores	16.4 min	32.9 min	137 hrs/yr	$4,249	1,641
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.

Norton Shores Commute Map

On average, it takes 16.4 minutes to get to work in Norton Shores. That's 27% shorter than the 22.4-minute U.S. average.

The most common departure window is 07:30 AM – 07:59 AM, followed by 08:00 AM – 08:29 AM. Driving is the most common commute choice, followed by working from home. About 11.8% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Norton Shores

• Car: 86.5%
• Worked at Home: 11.8%
• Other: 1.0%
• Walked: 0.3% unusually low
• Public Transportation: 0.2% unusually low
• Bicycle: 0.2%
• Taxi: < 0.1% unusually low
• Motorcycle: < 0.1% unusually low

Riding a motorcycle is essentially absent in Norton Shores, versus 0.1% in Michigan.

Walking is unusually rare in Norton Shores: 5.9 times less than the Michigan average (0.3% vs 2.0%).

Public transit is unusually rare in Norton Shores: 3.9 times less than the Michigan average (0.2% vs 0.9%).

Taking a taxi is unusually rare in Norton Shores: 30154.3 times less than the Michigan average (0.0% vs 0.1%).

Few people walk or bike to work in Norton Shores: just 0.5%, 4.7 times below the Michigan average of 2.3%.

Commute Mode Trends in Norton Shores, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Norton Shores 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
• Bicycle
• Taxi
• Motorcycle

Show commute mode data by year

Year	Car	Worked at Home	Other	Walked	Public Transportation	Bicycle	Taxi	Motorcycle
2009	93.7%	4.0%	0.5%	0.9%	0.4%	0.3%	0.0%	0.2%
2010	94.3%	3.7%	0.4%	0.6%	0.4%	0.5%	0.0%	0.2%
2011	95.3%	3.4%	0.1%	0.4%	0.3%	0.5%	0.0%	0.1%
2012	95.7%	2.7%	0.4%	0.4%	0.2%	0.6%	0.0%	0.1%
2013	95.2%	3.1%	0.3%	0.4%	0.3%	0.7%	0.0%	0.0%
2014	95.2%	2.9%	0.6%	0.4%	0.2%	0.7%	0.0%	0.0%
2015	94.8%	2.9%	0.9%	0.6%	0.2%	0.6%	0.0%	0.0%
2016	94.6%	2.8%	0.7%	1.2%	0.1%	0.6%	0.0%	0.0%
2017	95.2%	2.6%	0.5%	1.0%	0.3%	0.4%	0.0%	0.0%
2018	95.3%	2.5%	0.5%	1.0%	0.3%	0.3%	0.0%	0.1%
2019	95.6%	2.5%	0.4%	1.0%	0.2%	0.3%	0.0%	0.1%
2020	93.9%	4.8%	0.1%	0.8%	0.2%	0.1%	0.0%	0.1%
2021	91.6%	7.0%	0.7%	0.3%	0.2%	0.1%	0.0%	0.1%
2022	90.2%	8.6%	0.8%	0.2%	0.1%	0.1%	0.0%	0.1%
2023	88.4%	10.0%	1.0%	0.5%	0.1%	0.1%	0.0%	0.0%
2024	86.5%	11.8%	1.0%	0.3%	0.2%	0.2%	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 2012 at 95.7%. Overall it fell from 93.7% in 2009 to 86.5% in 2024, down 7.2 percentage points. It has fallen in each of the last 5 releases.

Working from home gained the most ground in Norton Shores: its share of workers rose from 4.0% in 2009 to 11.8% in 2024, up 7.8 percentage points. Most of that increase, 9.3 points, came in the releases after 2019, which include the pandemic years.

Walking lost the most ground, falling from 0.9% to 0.3% of workers (down 0.6 percentage points).

Commute Start Times in Norton Shores

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Norton Shores?

The bars show when commuters in Norton Shores 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 Norton Shores7.7% Michigan5.3%	7.7%
5:00-5:29 AM	5:00-5:29 AM Norton Shores4.2% Michigan3.9%	4.2%
5:30-5:59 AM	5:30-5:59 AM Norton Shores4.6% Michigan5.1%	4.6%
6:00-6:29 AM	6:00-6:29 AM Norton Shores5.6% Michigan8.0%	5.6%
6:30-6:59 AM	6:30-6:59 AM Norton Shores6.9% Michigan9.0%	6.9%
7:00-7:29 AM	7:00-7:29 AM Norton Shores11.6% Michigan13.0%	11.6%
7:30-7:59 AM	7:30-7:59 AM Norton Shores16.8% Michigan12.1%	16.8%
8:00-8:29 AM	8:00-8:29 AM Norton Shores13.1% Michigan10.9%	13.1%
8:30-8:59 AM	8:30-8:59 AM Norton Shores5.1% Michigan5.6%	5.1%
9:00-9:59 AM	9:00-9:59 AM Norton Shores4.3% Michigan6.7%	4.3%
10:00-10:59 AM	10:00-10:59 AM Norton Shores3.6% Michigan3.2%	3.6%
11:00-11:59 AM	11:00-11:59 AM Norton Shores1.4% Michigan1.6%	1.4%
12:00-3:59 PM	12:00-3:59 PM Norton Shores6.9% Michigan8.5%	6.9%
4:00-11:59 PM	4:00-11:59 PM Norton Shores8.2% Michigan7.1%	8.2%

Norton Shores Michigan Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Norton Shores is 7:30-7:59 AM, when 16.8% of commuters leave home, compared with 12.1% across Michigan. Early starts are more common than in Michigan: 16.5% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 14.3% there. The morning rush is more concentrated than in Michigan: 48.3% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 45.0% there. About 1 in 4 commuters (24.4%) 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 Norton Shores, 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 Norton Shores 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 Norton Shores 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.

• Norton Shores
• Michigan
• United States

Show typical departure times by year

Year	Norton Shores	Michigan	United States
2009	7:44 AM	7:44 AM	7:37 AM
2010	7:43 AM	7:45 AM	7:38 AM
2011	7:42 AM	7:45 AM	7:38 AM
2012	7:48 AM	7:45 AM	7:38 AM
2013	7:49 AM	7:45 AM	7:39 AM
2014	7:53 AM	7:45 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:51 AM	7:44 AM	7:38 AM
2016	7:56 AM	7:44 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:49 AM	7:43 AM	7:38 AM
2018	7:49 AM	7:43 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:46 AM	7:42 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:48 AM	7:42 AM	7:37 AM
2021	7:44 AM	7:42 AM	7:37 AM
2022	7:50 AM	7:43 AM	7:37 AM
2023	7:50 AM	7:43 AM	7:38 AM
2024	7:47 AM	7:44 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Norton Shores were on the road by 7:47 AM, 3 minutes later than in 2009 (7:44 AM). Across Michigan, the typical start barely moved over the same years. Commuters in Norton Shores now leave 9 minutes later than the typical American commuter (7:38 AM).

How does Norton Shores's commute time compare?

Metric	Norton Shores	Michigan	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	16.4 min	21.3 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	08:00 AM – 08:29 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM
Work From Home	11.8%	13.5%	15.0%
Walked	0.3%	2.0%	2.4%
Public Transit	0.2%	0.9%	3.2%

The average commute time in Norton Shores is 16.4 minutes, shorter than the 21.3 minutes in Michigan.

0.2% commute by public transit, lower than the 0.9% in Michigan. 0.3% commute by walking, lower than the 2.0% in Michigan.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau