Waseca County Commute Time Map & Patterns

Commute Time Burden in Waseca County: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Waseca County spend about 41 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 172 hours, about 7.2 full days, spent commuting. That is 2% more time on the road than the Minnesota average of 20.3 minutes each way, a difference of 0.4 minutes.

Waseca County holds about 0.3% of Minnesota's population and accounts for roughly 0.3% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in Waseca County would save about 69 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $2,136 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)
Waseca County	20.7 min	41.4 min	172 hrs/yr	$5,341	601
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

Compare commute times among different counties

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On average, it takes 20.7 minutes to get to work in Waseca County. That's 8% shorter than the 22.4-minute U.S. average.

Slower than 71% 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 7.0% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Waseca County

• Car: 89.7%
• Worked at Home: 7.0%
• Walked: 2.5%
• Other: 0.6%
• Public Transportation: 0.2% unusually low
• Motorcycle: 0.1%
• Bicycle: < 0.1% unusually low
• Taxi: < 0.1% unusually low

Public transit is unusually rare in Waseca County: 10.8 times less than the Minnesota average (0.2% vs 1.8%).

Taking a taxi is essentially absent in Waseca County, versus 0.2% in Minnesota.

Biking is unusually rare in Waseca County: 464142.3 times less than the Minnesota average (0.0% vs 0.5%).

Commute Mode Trends in Waseca County, 2009-2024

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

Show commute mode data by year

Year	Car	Worked at Home	Walked	Other	Public Transportation	Motorcycle	Taxi	Bicycle
2009	89.8%	4.7%	3.4%	0.5%	0.2%	0.1%	0.0%	1.2%
2010	90.6%	4.7%	3.3%	0.3%	0.3%	0.1%	0.0%	0.7%
2011	90.4%	5.1%	3.1%	0.2%	0.4%	0.1%	0.0%	0.7%
2012	91.6%	5.0%	2.0%	0.2%	0.5%	0.0%	0.0%	0.6%
2013	90.1%	5.5%	2.3%	0.8%	0.5%	0.1%	0.0%	0.7%
2014	89.4%	6.1%	2.4%	0.9%	0.6%	0.1%	0.0%	0.6%
2015	90.2%	6.1%	1.7%	1.0%	0.6%	0.1%	0.0%	0.2%
2016	91.0%	5.3%	1.7%	1.0%	0.8%	0.0%	0.0%	0.2%
2017	91.1%	4.5%	1.9%	1.6%	0.6%	0.1%	0.0%	0.3%
2018	91.3%	5.1%	1.8%	1.2%	0.6%	0.0%	0.0%	0.1%
2019	91.1%	4.8%	2.0%	1.4%	0.3%	0.0%	0.0%	0.3%
2020	90.5%	4.6%	2.6%	2.0%	0.1%	0.0%	0.0%	0.2%
2021	89.2%	5.4%	2.6%	2.3%	0.1%	0.0%	0.0%	0.3%
2022	88.8%	6.3%	2.8%	1.7%	0.1%	0.0%	0.0%	0.2%
2023	89.6%	6.5%	2.2%	1.1%	0.2%	0.2%	0.0%	0.3%
2024	89.7%	7.0%	2.5%	0.6%	0.2%	0.1%	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 2012 at 91.6% and lowest in 2022 at 88.8%. Overall it held roughly steady, at 89.8% in 2009 and 89.7% in 2024. It has risen in each of the last 2 releases.

Working from home gained the most ground in Waseca County: its share of workers rose from 4.7% in 2009 to 7.0% in 2024, up 2.3 percentage points. Most of that increase, 2.2 points, came in the releases after 2019, which include the pandemic years.

Biking lost the most ground, falling from 1.2% to 0.0% of workers (down 1.2 percentage points).

Commute Start Times in Waseca County

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Waseca County?

The bars show when commuters in Waseca 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	12:00-4:59 AM Waseca County6.3% Minnesota5.0%	6.3%
5:00-5:29 AM	5:00-5:29 AM Waseca County6.8% Minnesota3.8%	6.8%
5:30-5:59 AM	5:30-5:59 AM Waseca County6.4% Minnesota5.2%	6.4%
6:00-6:29 AM	6:00-6:29 AM Waseca County7.5% Minnesota8.4%	7.5%
6:30-6:59 AM	6:30-6:59 AM Waseca County11.5% Minnesota10.2%	11.5%
7:00-7:29 AM	7:00-7:29 AM Waseca County17.7% Minnesota14.8%	17.7%
7:30-7:59 AM	7:30-7:59 AM Waseca County12.1% Minnesota13.8%	12.1%
8:00-8:29 AM	8:00-8:29 AM Waseca County5.8% Minnesota10.4%	5.8%
8:30-8:59 AM	8:30-8:59 AM Waseca County2.3% Minnesota4.7%	2.3%
9:00-9:59 AM	9:00-9:59 AM Waseca County4.7% Minnesota5.8%	4.7%
10:00-10:59 AM	10:00-10:59 AM Waseca County2.1% Minnesota2.7%	2.1%
11:00-11:59 AM	11:00-11:59 AM Waseca County1.2% Minnesota1.3%	1.2%
12:00-3:59 PM	12:00-3:59 PM Waseca County7.4% Minnesota8.2%	7.4%
4:00-11:59 PM	4:00-11:59 PM Waseca County8.2% Minnesota5.8%	8.2%

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

The busiest time to head out in Waseca County is 7:00-7:29 AM, when 17.7% of commuters leave home, compared with 14.8% across Minnesota. Early starts are more common than in Minnesota: 19.5% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 14.0% there. The morning rush is more spread out than in Minnesota: 47.1% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 49.2% there. About 1 in 4 commuters (23.7%) 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 Waseca 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 Waseca 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 Waseca 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.

• Waseca County
• Minnesota
• United States

Show typical departure times by year

Year	Waseca County	Minnesota	United States
2009	7:29 AM	7:36 AM	7:37 AM
2010	7:27 AM	7:36 AM	7:38 AM
2011	7:26 AM	7:36 AM	7:38 AM
2012	7:23 AM	7:36 AM	7:38 AM
2013	7:22 AM	7:36 AM	7:39 AM
2014	7:20 AM	7:36 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:17 AM	7:36 AM	7:38 AM
2016	7:20 AM	7:35 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:18 AM	7:34 AM	7:38 AM
2018	7:19 AM	7:34 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:20 AM	7:33 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:23 AM	7:33 AM	7:37 AM
2021	7:23 AM	7:33 AM	7:37 AM
2022	7:23 AM	7:34 AM	7:37 AM
2023	7:22 AM	7:35 AM	7:38 AM
2024	7:19 AM	7:36 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Waseca County were on the road by 7:19 AM, 10 minutes earlier than in 2009 (7:29 AM). Across Minnesota, the typical start barely moved over the same years. Commuters in Waseca County now leave 18 minutes earlier than the typical American commuter (7:38 AM).

How does Waseca County's commute time compare?

Metric	Waseca County	Minnesota	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	20.7 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	7.0%	17.6%	15.0%
Walked	2.5%	2.5%	2.4%
Public Transit	0.2%	1.8%	3.2%

The average commute time in Waseca County is 20.7 minutes, longer than the 20.3 minutes in Minnesota.

0.2% commute by public transit, lower than the 1.8% in Minnesota. The share of commuters using walking is about the same as Minnesota.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau