Albany Commute Time Map & Patterns

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

You 9/24/26, 4:01 PM

How much time do drivers in Albany spend on the road daily?

Map AI 9/24/26, 4:01 PM

Commute Time Burden in Albany: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Albany spend about 34 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 142 hours, about 5.9 full days, spent commuting. That is 15% less time on the road than the Oregon average of 20.1 minutes each way, a difference of 3.1 minutes.

Albany holds about 1.0% of Oregon's population but accounts for roughly 0.9% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in Albany would save about 57 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $1,760 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)
Albany	17.0 min	34.1 min	142 hrs/yr	$4,400	1,610
Oregon	20.1 min	40.3 min	168 hrs/yr	$5,203	967
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.

Albany Commute Map

On average, it takes 17.0 minutes to get to work in Albany. That's 24% 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 12.8% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Albany

Public transit is unusually rare in Albany: 5.9 times less than the Oregon average (0.4% vs 2.2%).

Commute Mode Trends in Albany, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Albany 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	Motorcycle	Bicycle	Public Transportation	Taxi
2009	86.5%	5.5%	4.2%	0.6%	0.5%	1.7%	0.9%	0.1%
2010	85.5%	5.7%	4.5%	0.6%	0.6%	2.1%	0.8%	0.1%
2011	86.7%	5.1%	4.3%	0.9%	0.5%	2.0%	0.6%	0.0%
2012	86.2%	4.7%	4.8%	1.6%	0.5%	1.6%	0.6%	0.0%
2013	87.0%	5.3%	4.1%	1.0%	0.3%	1.8%	0.4%	0.0%
2014	87.1%	4.6%	3.5%	1.8%	0.5%	1.8%	0.7%	0.0%
2015	88.2%	4.6%	3.6%	1.8%	0.4%	0.8%	0.6%	0.0%
2016	89.1%	4.5%	3.2%	1.4%	0.5%	0.8%	0.5%	0.0%
2017	89.8%	4.4%	2.9%	1.0%	0.6%	0.8%	0.4%	0.0%
2018	90.7%	4.2%	2.3%	1.1%	0.6%	0.6%	0.5%	0.0%
2019	90.6%	4.4%	2.8%	0.7%	0.3%	0.7%	0.4%	0.1%
2020	90.8%	5.0%	2.4%	0.7%	0.2%	0.6%	0.2%	0.1%
2021	88.1%	7.2%	2.5%	1.2%	0.0%	0.4%	0.5%	0.1%
2022	85.3%	9.5%	2.6%	1.4%	0.1%	0.5%	0.5%	0.1%
2023	82.3%	11.9%	3.4%	1.2%	0.1%	0.7%	0.4%	0.1%
2024	81.9%	12.8%	2.5%	1.3%	0.5%	0.5%	0.4%	0.1%

Driving was the most common way to get to work in every release from 2009 to 2024. Its share peaked in 2020 at 90.8%. Overall it fell from 86.5% in 2009 to 81.9% in 2024, down 4.6 percentage points. It has fallen in each of the last 4 releases.

Working from home gained the most ground in Albany: its share of workers rose from 5.5% in 2009 to 12.8% in 2024, up 7.3 percentage points. Most of that increase, 8.4 points, came in the releases after 2019, which include the pandemic years.

Walking lost the most ground, falling from 4.2% to 2.5% of workers (down 1.7 percentage points).

Commute Start Times in Albany

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Albany?

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

12:00-4:59 AM		7.9%
5:00-5:29 AM		3.1%
5:30-5:59 AM		6.0%
6:00-6:29 AM		6.0%
6:30-6:59 AM		9.8%
7:00-7:29 AM		16.1%
7:30-7:59 AM		15.3%
8:00-8:29 AM		7.7%
8:30-8:59 AM		6.3%
9:00-9:59 AM		4.4%
10:00-10:59 AM		2.7%
11:00-11:59 AM		1.3%
12:00-3:59 PM		6.4%
4:00-11:59 PM		7.0%

Albany Oregon Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Albany is 7:00-7:29 AM, when 16.1% of commuters leave home, compared with 13.0% across Oregon. Early starts are more common than in Oregon: 17.0% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 14.7% there. The morning rush is more concentrated than in Oregon: 48.8% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 46.3% there. About 1 in 5 commuters (21.9%) 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 Albany, 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 Albany 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 Albany next to Oregon 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	Albany	Oregon	United States
2009	7:33 AM	7:40 AM	7:37 AM
2010	7:35 AM	7:41 AM	7:38 AM
2011	7:37 AM	7:41 AM	7:38 AM
2012	7:42 AM	7:42 AM	7:38 AM
2013	7:45 AM	7:42 AM	7:39 AM
2014	7:47 AM	7:42 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:44 AM	7:41 AM	7:38 AM
2016	7:43 AM	7:40 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:41 AM	7:40 AM	7:38 AM
2018	7:40 AM	7:39 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:39 AM	7:38 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:40 AM	7:39 AM	7:37 AM
2021	7:37 AM	7:40 AM	7:37 AM
2022	7:31 AM	7:40 AM	7:37 AM
2023	7:32 AM	7:41 AM	7:38 AM
2024	7:32 AM	7:42 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Albany were on the road by 7:32 AM, almost exactly the same as in 2009. Across Oregon, meanwhile, the typical commuter now leaves 2 minutes later than in 2009. Commuters in Albany 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 Albany has moved 7 minutes earlier.

How does Albany's commute time compare?

Metric	Albany	Oregon	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	17.0 min	20.1 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	12.8%	19.0%	15.0%
Walked	2.5%	3.3%	2.4%
Public Transit	0.4%	2.2%	3.2%

The average commute time in Albany is 17.0 minutes, shorter than the 20.1 minutes in Oregon.

0.4% commute by public transit, lower than the 2.2% in Oregon. 2.5% commute by walking, lower than the 3.3% in Oregon.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau

Frequently Asked Questions

Common questions about commuting in Albany, Oregon.

Is commuting expensive in Albany, Oregon?

Commuters here spend an estimated 142 hours a year on the road, worth roughly $4,400 at a typical national wage. That's 15% less than the typical Oregon commuter spends.

What time should you leave for work to avoid traffic in Albany, Oregon?

Traffic peaks between 07:00 AM – 07:29 AM in Albany, Oregon. 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.

How common is public transit use in Albany, Oregon?

Public transit usage is significantly lower here than typical: about 0.4% of commuters use it versus 2.2% in Oregon, meaning a personal vehicle is essential for most workers.