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Monroe Commute Time Map & Patterns

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

You 9/24/26, 4:14 PM
How long is the round-trip commute in Monroe?
Map AI 9/24/26, 4:14 PM

Commute Time Burden in Monroe: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Monroe spend about 51 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 212 hours, about 8.8 full days, spent commuting. That is 16% more time on the road than the North Carolina average of 21.9 minutes each way, a difference of 3.6 minutes.

Monroe holds about 0.2% of North Carolina's population but accounts for roughly 0.3% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in Monroe would save about 85 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $2,627 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)
Monroe 25.4 min 50.8 min 212 hrs/yr $6,566 1,826
North Carolina 21.9 min 43.7 min 182 hrs/yr $5,645 1,609
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.

Monroe Commute Map

On average, it takes 25.4 minutes to get to work in Monroe. That's 13% longer than the 22.4-minute U.S. average.

The most common departure window is 07:00 AM – 07:29 AM, followed by 06:30 AM – 06:59 AM. Driving is the most common commute choice, followed by working from home. About 9.7% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Monroe

  • Car: 87.8%
  • Worked at Home: 9.7%
  • Other: 1.5%
  • Walked: 0.8%
  • Taxi: < 0.1%
  • Motorcycle: < 0.1%
  • Bicycle: < 0.1%
  • Public Transportation: < 0.1% unusually low

Public transit is unusually rare in Monroe: 74.7 times less than the North Carolina average (0.0% vs 0.7%).

Commute Mode Trends in Monroe, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Monroe 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 Other Walked Taxi Motorcycle Bicycle Public Transportation
2009 93.4% 3.1% 0.8% 1.3% 0.0% 0.4% 0.2% 0.8%
2010 93.2% 3.4% 1.1% 0.9% 0.0% 0.2% 0.2% 0.9%
2011 94.2% 3.1% 1.1% 0.6% 0.1% 0.2% 0.1% 0.6%
2012 94.3% 3.1% 0.9% 0.8% 0.1% 0.0% 0.1% 0.7%
2013 94.4% 3.1% 0.8% 0.6% 0.2% 0.0% 0.0% 0.9%
2014 94.0% 3.0% 0.9% 0.8% 0.2% 0.0% 0.0% 1.0%
2015 94.4% 2.8% 0.6% 1.2% 0.2% 0.0% 0.0% 0.8%
2016 94.5% 2.9% 0.5% 1.2% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.8%
2017 94.7% 2.7% 0.9% 0.9% 0.1% 0.0% 0.0% 0.6%
2018 95.0% 2.6% 1.0% 0.7% 0.1% 0.0% 0.1% 0.5%
2019 95.1% 2.7% 1.1% 0.6% 0.1% 0.0% 0.0% 0.3%
2020 94.5% 3.7% 0.9% 0.5% 0.1% 0.1% 0.1% 0.2%
2021 93.1% 5.3% 0.8% 0.4% 0.1% 0.1% 0.1% 0.1%
2022 92.6% 5.8% 0.4% 0.8% 0.0% 0.1% 0.2% 0.1%
2023 89.7% 8.3% 0.9% 1.0% 0.0% 0.1% 0.1% 0.0%
2024 87.8% 9.7% 1.5% 0.8% 0.1% 0.1% 0.1% 0.0%

Driving was the most common way to get to work in every release from 2009 to 2024. Its share peaked in 2019 at 95.1%. Overall it fell from 93.4% in 2009 to 87.8% in 2024, down 5.6 percentage points. It has fallen in each of the last 5 releases.

Working from home gained the most ground in Monroe: its share of workers rose from 3.1% in 2009 to 9.7% in 2024, up 6.6 percentage points. Most of that increase, 7.0 points, came in the releases after 2019, which include the pandemic years.

Public transit lost the most ground, falling from 0.8% to 0.0% of workers (down 0.8 percentage points).

Commute Start Times in Monroe

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Monroe?

The bars show when commuters in Monroe 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 North Carolina for comparison. Hover over or tap a row for the exact numbers.

12:00-4:59 AM
4.3%
5:00-5:29 AM
4.2%
5:30-5:59 AM
3.9%
6:00-6:29 AM
10.8%
6:30-6:59 AM
13.6%
7:00-7:29 AM
18.2%
7:30-7:59 AM
10.4%
8:00-8:29 AM
10.2%
8:30-8:59 AM
1.8%
9:00-9:59 AM
5.3%
10:00-10:59 AM
1.2%
11:00-11:59 AM
2.5%
12:00-3:59 PM
6.0%
4:00-11:59 PM
7.6%

Monroe North Carolina Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Monroe is 7:00-7:29 AM, when 18.2% of commuters leave home, compared with 15.3% across North Carolina. Early starts are about as common as in North Carolina: 12.4% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 12.5% there. The morning rush is more concentrated than in North Carolina: 52.5% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 50.0% there. About 1 in 4 commuters (22.5%) 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 Monroe, 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 Monroe 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 Monroe next to North Carolina 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 Monroe North Carolina United States
2009 7:23 AM 7:36 AM 7:37 AM
2010 7:19 AM 7:36 AM 7:38 AM
2011 7:19 AM 7:37 AM 7:38 AM
2012 7:19 AM 7:37 AM 7:38 AM
2013 7:20 AM 7:38 AM 7:39 AM
2014 7:17 AM 7:38 AM 7:39 AM
2015 7:18 AM 7:38 AM 7:38 AM
2016 7:19 AM 7:38 AM 7:38 AM
2017 7:19 AM 7:37 AM 7:38 AM
2018 7:23 AM 7:37 AM 7:37 AM
2019 7:24 AM 7:37 AM 7:37 AM
2020 7:33 AM 7:37 AM 7:37 AM
2021 7:32 AM 7:37 AM 7:37 AM
2022 7:32 AM 7:37 AM 7:37 AM
2023 7:25 AM 7:37 AM 7:38 AM
2024 7:22 AM 7:37 AM 7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Monroe were on the road by 7:22 AM, 1 minute earlier than in 2009 (7:23 AM). That goes against the trend across North Carolina, where the typical commuter now leaves 1 minute later than in 2009. Commuters in Monroe now leave 16 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 Monroe has moved 3 minutes earlier.

How does Monroe's commute time compare?

Metric Monroe North Carolina US Average
Avg. Commute Time 25.4 min 21.9 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 06:30 AM – 06:59 AM 07:30 AM – 07:59 AM 07:30 AM – 07:59 AM
Work From Home 9.7% 16.3% 15.0%
Walked 0.8% 1.6% 2.4%
Public Transit < 0.1% 0.7% 3.2%

The average commute time in Monroe is 25.4 minutes, longer than the 21.9 minutes in North Carolina.

0.0% commute by public transit, lower than the 0.7% in North Carolina. 0.8% commute by walking, lower than the 1.6% in North Carolina.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau

Monroe, NC Commute Compared With Nearby Cities

How Monroe, NC compares with the 1 cities closest to it.

Area Population One-way commute Work from home Typical departure
Monroe, NC 25,543 25.4 min #1/2 9.7% #2/2 7:22 AM #1/2
Indian Trail, NC 33,281 26.9 min 19.5% 7:29 AM

Frequently Asked Questions

Common questions about commuting in Monroe, North Carolina.

Is living in Monroe, North Carolina good for avoiding long commute costs?

Commuters here spend an estimated 212 hours a year on the road, worth roughly $6,566 at a typical national wage. That's 16% more than the typical North Carolina commuter spends.

When is peak congestion during the morning commute in Monroe, North Carolina?

Traffic peaks between 07:00 AM – 07:29 AM in Monroe, North Carolina. Leaving before or after this window is the single easiest way to avoid the heaviest local congestion, though 06:30 AM – 06:59 AM also sees a secondary bump.

Do people use public transit in Monroe, North Carolina?

Public transit usage is significantly lower here than typical: about 0.0% of commuters use it versus 0.7% in North Carolina, meaning a personal vehicle is essential for most workers.