Potter County Commute Time Map & Patterns

Commute Time Burden in Potter County: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Potter County spend about 21 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 87 hours, about 3.6 full days, spent commuting. That is 32% less time on the road than the South Dakota average of 15.3 minutes each way, a difference of 4.9 minutes.

Potter County holds about 0.3% of South Dakota's population but accounts for roughly 0.2% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in Potter County would save about 35 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $1,078 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)
Potter County	10.4 min	20.9 min	87 hrs/yr	$2,696	141
South Dakota	15.3 min	30.7 min	128 hrs/yr	$3,961	353
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: South Dakota Counties

Compare commute times among different counties

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On average, it takes 10.4 minutes to get to work in Potter County. That's 53% shorter than the 22.4-minute U.S. average.

Faster than 82% of counties in South Dakota

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 6.0% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Potter County

• Car: 88.3%
• Worked at Home: 6.0%
• Walked: 4.7%
• Other: 0.8%
• Motorcycle: 0.3%
• Bicycle: < 0.1% unusually low
• Public Transportation: < 0.1% unusually low
• Taxi: < 0.1% unusually low

Public transit is essentially absent in Potter County, versus 0.5% in South Dakota.

Taking a taxi is essentially absent in Potter County, versus 0.1% in South Dakota.

Biking is unusually rare in Potter County: 22971275.7 times less than the South Dakota average (0.0% vs 0.3%).

Commute Mode Trends in Potter County, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Potter 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.

• Car
• Worked at Home
• Walked
• Other
• Motorcycle
• Public Transportation
• Taxi
• Bicycle

Show commute mode data by year

Year	Car	Worked at Home	Walked	Other	Motorcycle	Public Transportation	Taxi	Bicycle
2009	77.5%	11.7%	8.6%	0.2%	0.3%	0.3%	0.0%	1.5%
2010	74.2%	13.6%	10.3%	0.2%	0.1%	0.3%	0.0%	1.4%
2011	78.4%	10.5%	9.5%	0.0%	0.2%	0.3%	0.0%	1.2%
2012	79.5%	10.5%	8.3%	0.0%	0.2%	0.3%	0.0%	1.3%
2013	84.8%	8.0%	5.7%	0.0%	0.2%	0.0%	0.0%	1.4%
2014	84.9%	8.1%	6.2%	0.0%	0.5%	0.0%	0.0%	0.4%
2015	85.7%	9.0%	4.7%	0.0%	0.4%	0.0%	0.0%	0.3%
2016	85.1%	9.1%	4.8%	0.0%	0.5%	0.0%	0.0%	0.5%
2017	86.3%	7.3%	5.3%	0.0%	0.5%	0.0%	0.0%	0.5%
2018	86.2%	7.3%	5.4%	0.0%	0.5%	0.0%	0.0%	0.5%
2019	85.2%	8.3%	5.4%	0.4%	0.4%	0.0%	0.0%	0.4%
2020	86.8%	6.7%	5.4%	0.3%	0.2%	0.0%	0.0%	0.7%
2021	87.3%	7.8%	3.6%	1.0%	0.3%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2022	87.2%	7.0%	4.5%	1.0%	0.2%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2023	84.9%	8.5%	5.2%	1.2%	0.3%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
2024	88.3%	6.0%	4.7%	0.8%	0.3%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%

Driving was the most common way to get to work in every release from 2009 to 2024. Its share bottomed out in 2010 at 74.2%. Overall it rose from 77.5% in 2009 to 88.3% in 2024, up 10.8 percentage points. It has risen in the latest release.

Working from home lost the most ground, falling from 11.7% to 6.0% of workers (down 5.7 percentage points).

Walking peaked at 10.3% in 2010 and has since fallen back to 4.7%.

Commute Start Times in Potter County

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Potter County?

The bars show when commuters in Potter 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 South Dakota for comparison. Hover over or tap a row for the exact numbers.

12:00-4:59 AM	12:00-4:59 AM Potter County1.4% South Dakota4.1%	1.4%
5:00-5:29 AM	5:00-5:29 AM Potter County1.6% South Dakota3.1%	1.6%
5:30-5:59 AM	5:30-5:59 AM Potter County2.3% South Dakota5.1%	2.3%
6:00-6:29 AM	6:00-6:29 AM Potter County7.5% South Dakota6.9%	7.5%
6:30-6:59 AM	6:30-6:59 AM Potter County5.2% South Dakota11.3%	5.2%
7:00-7:29 AM	7:00-7:29 AM Potter County24.4% South Dakota16.2%	24.4%
7:30-7:59 AM	7:30-7:59 AM Potter County21.0% South Dakota19.9%	21.0%
8:00-8:29 AM	8:00-8:29 AM Potter County16.8% South Dakota10.2%	16.8%
8:30-8:59 AM	8:30-8:59 AM Potter County8.2% South Dakota3.7%	8.2%
9:00-9:59 AM	9:00-9:59 AM Potter County6.3% South Dakota4.3%	6.3%
10:00-10:59 AM	10:00-10:59 AM Potter County1.0% South Dakota2.0%	1.0%
11:00-11:59 AM	11:00-11:59 AM Potter County0.2% South Dakota1.4%	0.2%
12:00-3:59 PM	12:00-3:59 PM Potter County4.0% South Dakota6.1%	4.0%
4:00-11:59 PM	4:00-11:59 PM Potter County0.2% South Dakota5.8%	0.2%

Potter County South Dakota Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Potter County is 7:00-7:29 AM, when 24.4% of commuters leave home, compared with 16.2% across South Dakota. Early starts are less common than in South Dakota: 5.3% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 12.2% there. The morning rush is more concentrated than in South Dakota: 67.4% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 57.7% there. About 1 in 9 commuters (11.7%) 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 Potter 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 Potter 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 Potter County next to South Dakota 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.

• Potter County
• South Dakota
• United States

Show typical departure times by year

Year	Potter County	South Dakota	United States
2009	7:49 AM	7:40 AM	7:37 AM
2010	7:54 AM	7:40 AM	7:38 AM
2011	7:47 AM	7:40 AM	7:38 AM
2012	7:49 AM	7:39 AM	7:38 AM
2013	7:44 AM	7:39 AM	7:39 AM
2014	7:44 AM	7:39 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:40 AM	7:39 AM	7:38 AM
2016	7:41 AM	7:38 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:41 AM	7:38 AM	7:38 AM
2018	7:41 AM	7:37 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:38 AM	7:37 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:37 AM	7:37 AM	7:37 AM
2021	7:37 AM	7:37 AM	7:37 AM
2022	7:32 AM	7:36 AM	7:37 AM
2023	7:37 AM	7:37 AM	7:38 AM
2024	7:41 AM	7:35 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Potter County were on the road by 7:41 AM, 8 minutes earlier than in 2009 (7:49 AM). The shift is sharper than across South Dakota, where the typical start moved 5 minutes earlier. Commuters in Potter County now leave 3 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 Potter County has moved 3 minutes later.

How does Potter County's commute time compare?

Metric	Potter County	South Dakota	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	10.4 min	15.3 min	22.4 min
Departure Window	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM
Secondary Departure Window	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM
Work From Home	6.0%	9.7%	15.0%
Walked	4.7%	3.1%	2.4%
Public Transit	< 0.1%	0.5%	3.2%

The average commute time in Potter County is 10.4 minutes, shorter than the 15.3 minutes in South Dakota.

0.0% commute by public transit, lower than the 0.5% in South Dakota. 4.7% commute by walking, higher than the 3.1% in South Dakota.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau