Steele County Commute Time Map & Patterns

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

You 9/24/26, 8:36 PM

How much time do drivers in Steele County spend on the road daily?

Map AI 9/24/26, 8:36 PM

Commute Time Burden in Steele County: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Steele County spend about 27 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 111 hours, about 4.6 full days, spent commuting. That is 35% less time on the road than the Minnesota average of 20.3 minutes each way, a difference of 7.0 minutes.

Steele County holds about 0.7% of Minnesota's population but accounts for roughly 0.4% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in Steele County would save about 44 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $1,375 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)
Steele County	13.3 min	26.6 min	111 hrs/yr	$3,437	656
Minnesota	20.3 min	40.6 min	169 hrs/yr	$5,249	854
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: Minnesota Counties

Fastest commutes among counties in Minnesota

Brown County (10.6 min)
Pennington County (10.8 min)
Cottonwood County (10.9 min)

Slowest commutes among counties in Minnesota

Chisago County (30.9 min)
Wright County (28.8 min)
Sherburne County (28.8 min)

Compare commute times among different counties

Steele County

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Average commute time

On average, it takes 13.3 minutes to get to work in Steele County. That's 41% shorter than the 22.4-minute U.S. average.

Faster than 80% of counties in Minnesota

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 8.7% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Steele County

Commute Mode Trends in Steele County, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Steele 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.

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	Public Transportation	Other	Motorcycle	Bicycle	Taxi
2009	90.3%	4.5%	2.8%	0.8%	0.9%	0.4%	0.2%	0.1%
2010	90.4%	4.4%	2.7%	0.9%	0.8%	0.5%	0.2%	0.1%
2011	91.7%	3.9%	2.3%	0.6%	0.6%	0.4%	0.5%	0.1%
2012	92.0%	3.5%	2.2%	0.8%	0.4%	0.5%	0.5%	0.1%
2013	91.8%	3.7%	2.4%	0.8%	0.2%	0.5%	0.5%	0.0%
2014	92.9%	3.3%	1.9%	0.5%	0.3%	0.5%	0.5%	0.1%
2015	93.5%	3.3%	1.6%	0.6%	0.4%	0.3%	0.3%	0.1%
2016	92.7%	3.7%	1.6%	0.8%	0.4%	0.6%	0.0%	0.1%
2017	92.2%	4.1%	1.8%	1.0%	0.4%	0.4%	0.1%	0.1%
2018	92.6%	3.6%	1.8%	1.1%	0.4%	0.4%	0.1%	0.1%
2019	91.8%	4.3%	2.3%	0.8%	0.4%	0.3%	0.1%	0.0%
2020	90.4%	5.3%	2.6%	0.8%	0.4%	0.3%	0.1%	0.1%
2021	89.7%	5.5%	2.8%	1.1%	0.4%	0.4%	0.0%	0.1%
2022	88.3%	6.9%	2.9%	0.9%	0.4%	0.5%	0.1%	0.1%
2023	86.2%	8.6%	2.9%	1.1%	0.5%	0.3%	0.3%	0.1%
2024	87.0%	8.7%	2.3%	0.9%	0.5%	0.3%	0.3%	0.1%

Driving was the most common way to get to work in every release from 2009 to 2024. Its share was highest in 2015 at 93.5% and lowest in 2023 at 86.2%. Overall it fell from 90.3% in 2009 to 87.0% in 2024, down 3.3 percentage points. It has risen in the latest release.

Working from home gained the most ground in Steele County: its share of workers rose from 4.5% in 2009 to 8.7% in 2024, up 4.2 percentage points. Most of that increase, 4.4 points, came in the releases after 2019, which include the pandemic years.

Walking lost the most ground, falling from 2.8% to 2.3% of workers (down 0.5 percentage points).

Commute Start Times in Steele County

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Steele County?

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

12:00-4:59 AM		7.0%
5:00-5:29 AM		7.0%
5:30-5:59 AM		6.8%
6:00-6:29 AM		7.0%
6:30-6:59 AM		10.8%
7:00-7:29 AM		16.6%
7:30-7:59 AM		16.4%
8:00-8:29 AM		6.9%
8:30-8:59 AM		2.0%
9:00-9:59 AM		3.0%
10:00-10:59 AM		1.9%
11:00-11:59 AM		0.9%
12:00-3:59 PM		8.2%
4:00-11:59 PM		5.5%

Steele County Minnesota Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Steele County is 7:00-7:29 AM, when 16.6% of commuters leave home, compared with 14.8% across Minnesota. Early starts are more common than in Minnesota: 20.9% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 14.0% there. The morning rush looks much like Minnesota's: 50.7% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 49.2% there. About 1 in 5 commuters (19.4%) 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 Steele 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 Steele 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 Steele County next to Minnesota 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	Steele County	Minnesota	United States
2009	7:23 AM	7:36 AM	7:37 AM
2010	7:23 AM	7:36 AM	7:38 AM
2011	7:24 AM	7:36 AM	7:38 AM
2012	7:23 AM	7:36 AM	7:38 AM
2013	7:24 AM	7:36 AM	7:39 AM
2014	7:25 AM	7:36 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:28 AM	7:36 AM	7:38 AM
2016	7:27 AM	7:35 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:23 AM	7:34 AM	7:38 AM
2018	7:27 AM	7:34 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:28 AM	7:33 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:24 AM	7:33 AM	7:37 AM
2021	7:26 AM	7:33 AM	7:37 AM
2022	7:25 AM	7:34 AM	7:37 AM
2023	7:22 AM	7:35 AM	7:38 AM
2024	7:20 AM	7:36 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Steele County were on the road by 7:20 AM, 2 minutes earlier than in 2009 (7:23 AM). Across Minnesota, the typical start barely moved over the same years. Commuters in Steele County now leave 17 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 Steele County has moved 8 minutes earlier. The 2024 release is the earliest typical start for Steele County in the whole series.

How does Steele County's commute time compare?

Metric	Steele County	Minnesota	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	13.3 min	20.3 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	8.7%	17.6%	15.0%
Walked	2.3%	2.5%	2.4%
Public Transit	0.9%	1.8%	3.2%

The average commute time in Steele County is 13.3 minutes, shorter than the 20.3 minutes in Minnesota.

0.9% commute by public transit, lower than the 1.8% in Minnesota. 2.3% commute by walking, lower than the 2.5% in Minnesota.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau

Steele County, MN Commute Compared With Nearby Counties

Steele County, MN is the 3rd largest of the 6 counties compared here, 37,436 residents against a local median of 30,623. Where Steele County, MN breaks from the counties next to it is one-way commute, sitting 23% below the local median of 17.3 min at 13.3 min. That is the better end of the local range on this measure.

The counties themselves spread 9.8 min on one-way commute, so Steele County, MN sits at one end of an already wide local range rather than apart from it. Steele County, MN has the lowest one-way commute of the 6 areas compared here.

Area	Population	One-way commute	Work from home	Typical departure
Steele County, MN	37,436	13.3 min #1/6	8.7% #3/6	7:20 AM #3/6
Rice County, MN	67,917	17.3 min	12.0%	7:32 AM
Waseca County, MN	18,885	20.7 min	7.0%	7:19 AM
Dodge County, MN	21,046	23.5 min	12.9%	7:05 AM
Freeborn County, MN	30,623	15.7 min	7.6%	7:30 AM
Mower County, MN	40,341	13.7 min	7.3%	7:22 AM

Frequently Asked Questions

Common questions about commuting in Steele County, Minnesota.

Is living in Steele County, Minnesota good for avoiding long commute costs?

Commuters here spend an estimated 111 hours a year on the road, worth roughly $3,437 at a typical national wage. That's 35% less than the typical Minnesota commuter spends.

When is peak congestion during the morning commute in Steele County, Minnesota?

Traffic peaks between 07:00 AM – 07:29 AM in Steele County, Minnesota. 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.

How do commute times compare across counties in Minnesota?

Among counties in Minnesota, the shortest average commutes are in Brown County (10.6 min), Pennington County (10.8 min), Cottonwood County (10.9 min). The longest are in Chisago County (30.9 min), Wright County (28.8 min), Sherburne County (28.8 min).