Mercer County Commute Time Map & Patterns

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

You 9/24/26, 8:37 PM

How long is the round-trip commute in Mercer County?

Map AI 9/24/26, 8:37 PM

Commute Time Burden in Mercer County: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Mercer County spend about 42 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 176 hours, about 7.3 full days, spent commuting. That is 1% more time on the road than the Missouri average of 21.0 minutes each way, a difference of 0.1 minutes.

Mercer County holds about 0.1% of Missouri's population and accounts for roughly 0.1% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in Mercer County would save about 70 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $2,181 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)
Mercer County	21.1 min	42.2 min	176 hrs/yr	$5,452	218
Missouri	21.0 min	41.9 min	175 hrs/yr	$5,415	923
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: Missouri Counties

Fastest commutes among counties in Missouri

Saline County (11.9 min)
Adair County (12.0 min)
Nodaway County (12.1 min)

Slowest commutes among counties in Missouri

Bollinger County (33.1 min)
Ray County (32.2 min)
Maries County (31.9 min)

Compare commute times among different counties

Mercer County

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Average commute time

On average, it takes 21.1 minutes to get to work in Mercer County. That's 6% shorter 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 13.2% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Mercer County

Riding a motorcycle is essentially absent in Mercer County, versus 0.1% in Missouri.

Taking a taxi is essentially absent in Mercer County, versus 0.2% in Missouri.

Biking is unusually common in Mercer County: 7.6 times more than the Missouri average (1.4% vs 0.2%).

Commute Mode Trends in Mercer County, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Mercer 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	Bicycle	Walked	Public Transportation	Other	Taxi	Motorcycle
2009	85.4%	10.8%	0.1%	2.9%	0.0%	0.5%	0.0%	0.3%
2010	86.2%	10.6%	0.3%	1.7%	0.0%	0.8%	0.0%	0.3%
2011	87.7%	9.9%	0.2%	1.3%	0.0%	0.9%	0.0%	0.0%
2012	88.4%	8.7%	0.1%	2.2%	0.0%	0.5%	0.0%	0.0%
2013	85.0%	10.0%	0.3%	3.5%	0.3%	0.9%	0.0%	0.0%
2014	83.9%	7.9%	0.1%	6.0%	0.8%	1.3%	0.0%	0.0%
2015	84.9%	6.7%	0.2%	6.4%	0.9%	0.9%	0.0%	0.0%
2016	81.5%	9.6%	0.2%	6.8%	1.0%	0.9%	0.0%	0.0%
2017	82.1%	8.9%	0.1%	6.2%	1.1%	1.3%	0.4%	0.0%
2018	84.2%	8.7%	0.0%	5.0%	0.6%	1.0%	0.5%	0.0%
2019	84.6%	8.8%	0.0%	4.7%	0.0%	1.2%	0.7%	0.0%
2020	82.1%	15.2%	0.0%	1.0%	0.0%	1.0%	0.6%	0.0%
2021	87.0%	10.7%	0.0%	0.3%	0.0%	1.1%	0.9%	0.0%
2022	83.9%	13.3%	0.0%	1.6%	0.0%	1.1%	0.0%	0.0%
2023	82.1%	13.7%	1.7%	1.6%	0.0%	0.9%	0.0%	0.0%
2024	83.3%	13.2%	1.4%	1.2%	0.4%	0.3%	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 88.4% and lowest in 2016 at 81.5%. Overall it fell from 85.4% in 2009 to 83.3% in 2024, down 2.1 percentage points. It has risen in the latest release.

Working from home gained the most ground in Mercer County: its share of workers rose from 10.8% in 2009 to 13.2% in 2024, up 2.4 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 2.9% to 1.2% of workers (down 1.7 percentage points).

Biking overtook riding a motorcycle to become the 3rd most common choice in the 2023 release and has stayed ahead since.

Working from home peaked at 15.2% in 2020 and has since fallen back to 13.2%.

Commute Start Times in Mercer County

Earlier AlarmsThe 3rd-biggest shift to earlier mornings among Missouri's 115 counties: the typical start is 26 minutes earlier than in 2009.

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Mercer County?

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

12:00-4:59 AM		5.2%
5:00-5:29 AM		9.0%
5:30-5:59 AM		8.5%
6:00-6:29 AM		9.6%
6:30-6:59 AM		11.0%
7:00-7:29 AM		22.0%
7:30-7:59 AM		11.9%
8:00-8:29 AM		6.1%
8:30-8:59 AM		1.8%
9:00-9:59 AM		2.5%
10:00-10:59 AM		2.5%
11:00-11:59 AM		0.6%
12:00-3:59 PM		3.5%
4:00-11:59 PM		5.8%

Mercer County Missouri Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Mercer County is 7:00-7:29 AM, when 22.0% of commuters leave home, compared with 15.0% across Missouri. Early starts are more common than in Missouri: 22.8% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 14.5% there. The morning rush looks much like Missouri's: 51.0% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 49.1% there. About 1 in 7 commuters (14.8%) 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 Mercer 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 Mercer 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 Mercer County next to Missouri 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	Mercer County	Missouri	United States
2009	7:35 AM	7:33 AM	7:37 AM
2010	7:35 AM	7:33 AM	7:38 AM
2011	7:32 AM	7:33 AM	7:38 AM
2012	7:32 AM	7:33 AM	7:38 AM
2013	7:27 AM	7:33 AM	7:39 AM
2014	7:19 AM	7:33 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:28 AM	7:32 AM	7:38 AM
2016	7:25 AM	7:32 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:29 AM	7:32 AM	7:38 AM
2018	7:28 AM	7:31 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:28 AM	7:31 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:14 AM	7:32 AM	7:37 AM
2021	7:17 AM	7:32 AM	7:37 AM
2022	7:14 AM	7:32 AM	7:37 AM
2023	7:02 AM	7:32 AM	7:38 AM
2024	7:09 AM	7:32 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Mercer County were on the road by 7:09 AM, 26 minutes earlier than in 2009 (7:35 AM). Across Missouri, the typical start barely moved over the same years. Commuters in Mercer County now leave 29 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 Mercer County has moved 19 minutes earlier.

How does Mercer County's commute time compare?

Metric	Mercer County	Missouri	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	21.1 min	21.0 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	13.2%	13.0%	15.0%
Walked	1.2%	1.8%	2.4%
Public Transit	0.4%	0.8%	3.2%

The average commute time in Mercer County is about the same as in Missouri.

0.4% commute by public transit, lower than the 0.8% in Missouri. 1.2% commute by walking, lower than the 1.8% in Missouri.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau

Mercer County, MO Commute Compared With Nearby Counties

Mercer County, MO is the smallest of the 6 counties compared here, 3,482 residents against a local median of 7,759. The measure that sets Mercer County, MO apart most is work from home: 13.2%, 119% above the local median of 6.0%.

One-way commute tells the same story from another angle: 21.1 min against a local median of 15.6 min, 35% above it. The one measure here that carries a verdict is one-way commute, and at 35% above the local median it puts Mercer County, MO at the weaker end of the local range. The counties themselves spread 5.2% on work from home, so Mercer County, MO sits at one end of an already wide local range rather than apart from it. Mercer County, MO has the highest work from home of the 6 areas compared here.

Area	Population	One-way commute	Work from home	Typical departure
Mercer County, MO	3,482	21.1 min #6/6	13.2% #1/6	7:09 AM #2/6
Grundy County, MO	9,787	13.6 min	5.3%	7:25 AM
Decatur County, IA	7,759	15.9 min	6.0%	7:29 AM
Wayne County, IA	6,531	18.4 min	6.2%	7:17 AM
Harrison County, MO	8,190	15.5 min	9.7%	7:22 AM
Sullivan County, MO	5,857	15.6 min	4.5%	6:52 AM

Frequently Asked Questions

Common questions about commuting in Mercer County, Missouri.

Is commuting expensive in Mercer County, Missouri?

Commuters here spend an estimated 176 hours a year on the road, worth roughly $5,452 at a typical national wage. That's 1% more than the typical Missouri commuter spends.

What time should you leave for work to avoid traffic in Mercer County, Missouri?

Traffic peaks between 07:00 AM – 07:29 AM in Mercer County, Missouri. 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.

Which counties in Missouri have the fastest and slowest commutes?

Among counties in Missouri, the shortest average commutes are in Saline County (11.9 min), Adair County (12.0 min), Nodaway County (12.1 min). The longest are in Bollinger County (33.1 min), Ray County (32.2 min), Maries County (31.9 min).