Kearny Commute Time Map & Patterns

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

You 9/24/26, 4:10 PM

What does a typical morning commute look like in Kearny?

Map AI 9/24/26, 4:10 PM

Commute Time Burden in Kearny: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Kearny spend about 60 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 252 hours, about 10.5 full days, spent commuting. That is 16% more time on the road than the New Jersey average of 26.2 minutes each way, a difference of 4.1 minutes.

Kearny holds about 0.4% of New Jersey's population but accounts for roughly 0.5% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in Kearny would save about 101 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $3,126 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)
Kearny	30.2 min	60.5 min	252 hrs/yr	$7,814	3,097
New Jersey	26.2 min	52.4 min	218 hrs/yr	$6,764	2,109
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.

Kearny Commute Map

On average, it takes 30.2 minutes to get to work in Kearny. That's 35% longer than the 22.4-minute U.S. average.

The most common departure window is 08:00 AM – 08:29 AM, followed by 07:00 AM – 07:29 AM. Driving is the most common commute choice, followed by public transit. About 5.9% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Kearny

Riding a motorcycle is essentially absent in Kearny, versus 0.0% in New Jersey.

Commute Mode Trends in Kearny, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Kearny 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	Public Transportation	Walked	Worked at Home	Taxi	Other	Bicycle	Motorcycle
2009	77.1%	12.6%	6.5%	0.9%	0.2%	2.5%	0.2%	0.0%
2010	75.9%	14.1%	6.5%	0.9%	0.2%	2.4%	0.1%	0.0%
2011	78.0%	13.5%	6.0%	0.9%	0.2%	1.3%	0.2%	0.0%
2012	78.5%	12.9%	5.4%	1.5%	0.2%	1.4%	0.1%	0.0%
2013	78.1%	13.4%	5.3%	2.2%	0.1%	0.5%	0.4%	0.0%
2014	78.4%	13.2%	4.8%	1.7%	0.1%	1.4%	0.3%	0.0%
2015	75.9%	14.4%	5.2%	1.7%	0.3%	2.1%	0.3%	0.0%
2016	75.9%	13.7%	4.9%	1.4%	0.3%	3.5%	0.3%	0.0%
2017	74.8%	14.2%	4.9%	1.7%	0.2%	4.0%	0.3%	0.0%
2018	75.6%	14.1%	4.6%	1.6%	0.2%	3.7%	0.2%	0.0%
2019	75.7%	15.3%	4.4%	1.8%	0.2%	2.5%	0.1%	0.0%
2020	77.1%	14.5%	4.6%	2.1%	0.3%	1.5%	0.1%	0.0%
2021	75.5%	14.9%	5.5%	3.1%	0.3%	0.5%	0.3%	0.0%
2022	76.2%	13.0%	5.8%	4.2%	0.3%	0.4%	0.2%	0.0%
2023	74.5%	13.3%	6.0%	5.3%	0.1%	0.5%	0.4%	0.0%
2024	73.8%	12.7%	6.1%	5.9%	0.5%	0.5%	0.4%	0.0%

Driving was the most common way to get to work in every release from 2009 to 2024. Its share peaked in 2012 at 78.5%. Overall it fell from 77.1% in 2009 to 73.8% in 2024, down 3.3 percentage points. It has fallen in each of the last 2 releases.

Working from home gained the most ground in Kearny: its share of workers rose from 0.9% in 2009 to 5.9% in 2024, up 5.0 percentage points. Most of that increase, 4.1 points, came in the releases after 2019, which include the pandemic years.

Public transit peaked at 15.3% in 2019 and has since fallen back to 12.7%.

Commute Start Times in Kearny

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Kearny?

The bars show when commuters in Kearny 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 New Jersey for comparison. Hover over or tap a row for the exact numbers.

12:00-4:59 AM		3.7%
5:00-5:29 AM		4.3%
5:30-5:59 AM		6.9%
6:00-6:29 AM		7.4%
6:30-6:59 AM		10.1%
7:00-7:29 AM		13.2%
7:30-7:59 AM		10.6%
8:00-8:29 AM		13.8%
8:30-8:59 AM		5.7%
9:00-9:59 AM		6.8%
10:00-10:59 AM		2.4%
11:00-11:59 AM		1.8%
12:00-3:59 PM		7.1%
4:00-11:59 PM		6.0%

Kearny New Jersey Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Kearny is 8:00-8:29 AM, when 13.8% of commuters leave home, compared with 14.0% across New Jersey. Early starts are more common than in New Jersey: 14.9% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 10.9% there. The morning rush looks much like New Jersey's: 47.7% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 49.0% there. About 1 in 4 commuters (24.2%) 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 Kearny, 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 Kearny 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 Kearny next to New Jersey 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	Kearny	New Jersey	United States
2009	7:35 AM	7:48 AM	7:37 AM
2010	7:32 AM	7:49 AM	7:38 AM
2011	7:30 AM	7:49 AM	7:38 AM
2012	7:34 AM	7:50 AM	7:38 AM
2013	7:39 AM	7:51 AM	7:39 AM
2014	7:40 AM	7:51 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:32 AM	7:51 AM	7:38 AM
2016	7:29 AM	7:51 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:25 AM	7:50 AM	7:38 AM
2018	7:23 AM	7:50 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:22 AM	7:49 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:30 AM	7:49 AM	7:37 AM
2021	7:33 AM	7:49 AM	7:37 AM
2022	7:36 AM	7:50 AM	7:37 AM
2023	7:41 AM	7:50 AM	7:38 AM
2024	7:42 AM	7:50 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Kearny were on the road by 7:42 AM, 7 minutes later than in 2009 (7:35 AM). The shift is sharper than across New Jersey, where the typical start moved 2 minutes later. Commuters in Kearny now leave 4 minutes later than the typical American commuter (7:38 AM). Since the 2019 release, which covers the years just before the pandemic, the typical start in Kearny has moved 21 minutes later. The 2024 release is the latest typical start for Kearny in the whole series.

How does Kearny's commute time compare?

Metric	Kearny	New Jersey	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	30.2 min	26.2 min	22.4 min
Departure Window	08:00 AM – 08:29 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM
Secondary Departure Window	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	08:00 AM – 08:29 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM
Work From Home	5.9%	16.8%	15.0%
Walked	6.1%	2.6%	2.4%
Public Transit	12.7%	8.1%	3.2%

The average commute time in Kearny is 30.2 minutes, longer than the 26.2 minutes in New Jersey.

12.7% commute by public transit, higher than the 8.1% in New Jersey. 6.1% commute by walking, higher than the 2.6% in New Jersey.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau

Kearny, NJ Commute Compared With Nearby Cities

Kearny, NJ is the 2nd largest of the 4 cities compared here, 40,646 residents against a local median of 21,687. Kearny, NJ's work from home, at 5.9%, runs 70% below the 19.8% typical of the cities around it.

The cities themselves spread 17.5% on work from home, so Kearny, NJ sits at one end of an already wide local range rather than apart from it. Kearny, NJ has the 4th highest work from home of the 4 areas compared here.

Area	Population	One-way commute	Work from home	Typical departure
Kearny, NJ	40,646	30.2 min #2/4	5.9% #4/4	7:42 AM #2/4
Harrison, NJ	20,334	36.8 min	19.8%	7:59 AM
Newark, NJ	309,652	30.2 min	7.3%	7:35 AM
Secaucus, NJ	21,687	33.0 min	24.8%	7:57 AM

Frequently Asked Questions

Common questions about commuting in Kearny, New Jersey.

Is living in Kearny, New Jersey good for avoiding long commute costs?

Commuters here spend an estimated 252 hours a year on the road, worth roughly $7,814 at a typical national wage. That's 16% more than the typical New Jersey commuter spends.

When is peak congestion during the morning commute in Kearny, New Jersey?

Traffic peaks between 08:00 AM – 08:29 AM in Kearny, New Jersey. 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.