Carter County Commute Time Map & Patterns

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

You 9/24/26, 2:56 PM

How many minutes is the average drive to work in Carter County?

Map AI 9/24/26, 2:56 PM

Commute Time Burden in Carter County: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Carter 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 112 hours, about 4.7 full days, spent commuting. That is 16% less time on the road than the Montana average of 16.0 minutes each way, a difference of 2.6 minutes.

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

Working from home just 2 days a week in Carter County would save about 45 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $1,388 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)
Carter County	13.4 min	26.9 min	112 hrs/yr	$3,469	38
Montana	16.0 min	32.1 min	134 hrs/yr	$4,143	403
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: Montana Counties

Fastest commutes among counties in Montana

Treasure County (7.2 min)
Rosebud County (8.2 min)
Fallon County (8.4 min)

Slowest commutes among counties in Montana

Broadwater County (30.3 min)
Stillwater County (27.8 min)
Granite County (23.3 min)

Compare commute times among different counties

Carter County

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Average commute time

On average, it takes 13.4 minutes to get to work in Carter County. That's 40% shorter than the 22.4-minute U.S. average.

The most common departure window is 07:30 AM – 07:59 AM, followed by 07:00 AM – 07:29 AM. Driving is the most common commute choice, followed by working from home. About 39.5% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Carter County

Riding a motorcycle is unusually common in Carter County: 3.1 times more than the Montana average (0.3% vs 0.1%).

Driving is 37% less common in Carter County than the Montana average (50.5% vs 80.8%).

Taking a taxi is essentially absent in Carter County, versus 0.1% in Montana.

Working from home is unusually common in Carter County: 3.2 times more than the Montana average (39.5% vs 12.5%).

Commute Mode Trends in Carter County, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Carter 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	Other	Public Transportation	Motorcycle	Bicycle	Taxi
2009	52.9%	32.8%	12.6%	0.3%	0.0%	0.6%	0.8%	0.0%
2010	56.8%	28.8%	13.4%	0.3%	0.0%	0.0%	0.7%	0.0%
2011	54.0%	30.3%	15.4%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	0.3%	0.0%
2012	51.7%	32.5%	15.4%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	0.4%	0.0%
2013	53.7%	28.6%	16.2%	1.1%	0.0%	0.2%	0.3%	0.0%
2014	55.7%	27.3%	14.1%	1.9%	0.0%	0.3%	0.7%	0.0%
2015	57.3%	25.1%	14.8%	2.2%	0.0%	0.2%	0.5%	0.0%
2016	56.1%	26.9%	13.9%	2.3%	0.0%	0.2%	0.6%	0.0%
2017	59.4%	24.5%	11.0%	4.2%	0.0%	0.2%	0.7%	0.0%
2018	58.6%	26.5%	10.7%	3.3%	0.0%	0.0%	0.9%	0.0%
2019	63.4%	22.3%	12.9%	0.8%	0.0%	0.0%	0.6%	0.0%
2020	63.7%	23.9%	11.4%	0.5%	0.0%	0.0%	0.5%	0.0%
2021	56.0%	33.7%	9.3%	0.6%	0.0%	0.0%	0.3%	0.0%
2022	57.9%	31.3%	9.0%	1.9%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2023	59.2%	29.7%	8.1%	1.6%	1.0%	0.5%	0.0%	0.0%
2024	50.5%	39.5%	5.2%	3.4%	0.7%	0.3%	0.3%	0.0%

Driving was the most common way to get to work in every release from 2009 to 2024. Its share peaked in 2020 at 63.7%. Overall it fell from 52.9% in 2009 to 50.5% in 2024, down 2.4 percentage points. It has fallen in the latest release.

Working from home gained the most ground in Carter County: its share of workers rose from 32.8% in 2009 to 39.5% in 2024, up 6.7 percentage points. Most of that increase, 17.2 points, came in the releases after 2019, which include the pandemic years.

Walking lost the most ground, falling from 12.6% to 5.2% of workers (down 7.4 percentage points).

Commute Start Times in Carter County

Rush-Hour RegularsThe highest share of rush-hour departures among Montana's 56 counties: 77.7% of commuters leave between 6:30 and 8:29 AM.

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Carter County?

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

12:00-4:59 AM		3.9%
5:00-5:29 AM		3.6%
5:30-5:59 AM		2.0%
6:00-6:29 AM		5.9%
6:30-6:59 AM		10.6%
7:00-7:29 AM		22.6%
7:30-7:59 AM		26.3%
8:00-8:29 AM		18.2%
8:30-8:59 AM		0.8%
9:00-9:59 AM		0.0%
10:00-10:59 AM		3.9%
11:00-11:59 AM		0.8%
12:00-3:59 PM		1.1%
4:00-11:59 PM		0.3%

Carter County Montana Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Carter County is 7:30-7:59 AM, when 26.3% of commuters leave home, compared with 19.2% across Montana. Early starts are less common than in Montana: 9.5% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 10.7% there. The morning rush is more concentrated than in Montana: 77.7% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 55.0% there. About 1 in 16 commuters (6.1%) 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 Carter 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 Carter 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 Carter County next to Montana 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	Carter County	Montana	United States
2009	7:39 AM	7:45 AM	7:37 AM
2010	7:33 AM	7:45 AM	7:38 AM
2011	7:25 AM	7:45 AM	7:38 AM
2012	7:33 AM	7:45 AM	7:38 AM
2013	7:23 AM	7:45 AM	7:39 AM
2014	7:27 AM	7:45 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:31 AM	7:44 AM	7:38 AM
2016	7:29 AM	7:44 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:30 AM	7:44 AM	7:38 AM
2018	7:26 AM	7:44 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:37 AM	7:44 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:44 AM	7:45 AM	7:37 AM
2021	7:43 AM	7:45 AM	7:37 AM
2022	7:40 AM	7:44 AM	7:37 AM
2023	7:39 AM	7:43 AM	7:38 AM
2024	7:32 AM	7:43 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Carter County were on the road by 7:32 AM, 8 minutes earlier than in 2009 (7:39 AM). The shift is sharper than across Montana, where the typical start moved 2 minutes earlier. Commuters in Carter County now leave 6 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 Carter County has moved 5 minutes earlier.

How does Carter County's commute time compare?

Metric	Carter County	Montana	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	13.4 min	16.0 min	22.4 min
Departure Window	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM
Secondary Departure Window	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM
Work From Home	39.5%	12.5%	15.0%
Walked	5.2%	3.9%	2.4%
Public Transit	0.7%	0.6%	3.2%

The average commute time in Carter County is 13.4 minutes, shorter than the 16.0 minutes in Montana.

0.7% commute by public transit, higher than the 0.6% in Montana. 5.2% commute by walking, higher than the 3.9% in Montana.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau

Carter County, MT Commute Compared With Nearby Counties

Carter County, MT is the 5th largest of the 6 counties compared here, 1,308 residents against a local median of 2,760. The measure that sets Carter County, MT apart most is work from home: 39.5%, 252% above the local median of 11.2%.

One-way commute tells the same story from another angle: 13.4 min against a local median of 10.6 min, 27% above it. The one measure here that carries a verdict is one-way commute, and at 27% above the local median it puts Carter County, MT at the weaker end of the local range. The counties themselves sit within 13.3% of each other on work from home, a tighter band than the gap between any of them and Carter County, MT, which makes it a genuine outlier here rather than one end of a wide local spread. Carter County, MT has the highest work from home of the 6 areas compared here.

Area	Population	One-way commute	Work from home	Typical departure
Carter County, MT	1,308	13.4 min #5/6	39.5% #1/6	7:32 AM #6/6
Fallon County, MT	2,760	8.4 min	6.2%	7:21 AM
Crook County, WY	7,442	17.5 min	11.2%	6:54 AM
Harding County, SD	1,148	11.5 min	16.4%	7:07 AM
Powder River County, MT	1,815	10.6 min	19.6%	7:18 AM
Bowman County, ND	2,906	8.3 min	9.0%	7:25 AM

Frequently Asked Questions

Common questions about commuting in Carter County, Montana.

How much does the average commute cost workers in Carter County, Montana?

Commuters here spend an estimated 112 hours a year on the road, worth roughly $3,469 at a typical national wage. That's 16% less than the typical Montana commuter spends.

When is rush hour worst in Carter County, Montana?

Traffic peaks between 07:30 AM – 07:59 AM in Carter County, Montana. Leaving before or after this window is the single easiest way to avoid the heaviest local congestion, though 07:00 AM – 07:29 AM also sees a secondary bump.

How much time do residents in Carter County, Montana save by working from home?

About 39.5% of workers here already work from home. Working from home just 2 days a week in Carter County would save about 45 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $1,388 at the same national wage assumption used above.

Where are the quickest and slowest commutes among counties in Montana?

Among counties in Montana, the shortest average commutes are in Treasure County (7.2 min), Rosebud County (8.2 min), Fallon County (8.4 min). The longest are in Broadwater County (30.3 min), Stillwater County (27.8 min), Granite County (23.3 min).