Richardson Commute Time Map & Patterns

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

You 9/24/26, 4:21 PM

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

Map AI 9/24/26, 4:21 PM

Commute Time Burden in Richardson: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Richardson spend about 44 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 185 hours, about 7.7 full days, spent commuting. That is 3% less time on the road than the Texas average of 22.8 minutes each way, a difference of 0.6 minutes.

Richardson holds about 0.4% of Texas's population and accounts for roughly 0.4% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in Richardson would save about 74 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $2,296 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)
Richardson	22.2 min	44.4 min	185 hrs/yr	$5,740	3,536
Texas	22.8 min	45.6 min	190 hrs/yr	$5,888	1,441
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.

Richardson Commute Map

On average, it takes 22.2 minutes to get to work in Richardson. That's 1% shorter than the 22.4-minute U.S. average.

The most common departure window is 07:00 AM – 07:29 AM, followed by 08:00 AM – 08:29 AM. Driving is the most common commute choice, followed by working from home. About 24.6% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Richardson

Commute Mode Trends in Richardson, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Richardson 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	Public Transportation	Other	Bicycle	Taxi	Motorcycle
2009	88.5%	5.0%	2.3%	2.8%	0.8%	0.3%	0.0%	0.3%
2010	88.0%	5.0%	2.2%	2.8%	1.4%	0.4%	0.0%	0.2%
2011	88.0%	5.2%	2.1%	2.5%	1.5%	0.5%	0.1%	0.1%
2012	88.2%	5.5%	2.2%	2.2%	1.4%	0.4%	0.0%	0.2%
2013	88.5%	5.2%	2.1%	2.3%	1.4%	0.3%	0.0%	0.2%
2014	88.0%	5.9%	2.0%	2.3%	1.2%	0.5%	0.1%	0.2%
2015	87.3%	6.9%	2.3%	2.2%	0.6%	0.4%	0.1%	0.2%
2016	87.3%	7.1%	2.3%	2.2%	0.6%	0.3%	0.1%	0.2%
2017	87.1%	7.4%	2.2%	2.5%	0.5%	0.2%	0.1%	0.1%
2018	86.0%	7.9%	2.0%	3.0%	0.6%	0.3%	0.2%	0.1%
2019	86.5%	7.4%	2.3%	2.8%	0.5%	0.2%	0.1%	0.1%
2020	81.7%	11.7%	2.4%	2.9%	0.9%	0.2%	0.1%	0.0%
2021	77.2%	16.0%	2.7%	2.6%	1.1%	0.2%	0.1%	0.0%
2022	73.8%	19.5%	2.9%	2.4%	1.1%	0.2%	0.1%	0.0%
2023	70.4%	22.9%	2.8%	2.3%	1.3%	0.2%	0.1%	0.0%
2024	68.9%	24.6%	2.9%	1.7%	1.3%	0.3%	0.2%	0.0%

Driving was the most common way to get to work in every release from 2009 to 2024. Overall its share fell from 88.5% in 2009 to 68.9% in 2024, down 19.6 percentage points. It has fallen in each of the last 5 releases.

Working from home gained the most ground in Richardson: its share of workers rose from 5.0% in 2009 to 24.6% in 2024, up 19.6 percentage points. Most of that increase, 17.2 points, came in the releases after 2019, which include the pandemic years.

Public transit lost the most ground, falling from 2.8% to 1.7% of workers (down 1.1 percentage points).

Walking overtook public transit to become the 3rd most common choice in the 2021 release and has stayed ahead since.

Commute Start Times in Richardson

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Richardson?

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

12:00-4:59 AM		2.2%
5:00-5:29 AM		1.7%
5:30-5:59 AM		2.6%
6:00-6:29 AM		6.3%
6:30-6:59 AM		7.3%
7:00-7:29 AM		14.4%
7:30-7:59 AM		13.3%
8:00-8:29 AM		13.6%
8:30-8:59 AM		9.0%
9:00-9:59 AM		10.8%
10:00-10:59 AM		4.4%
11:00-11:59 AM		2.3%
12:00-3:59 PM		7.2%
4:00-11:59 PM		5.0%

Richardson Texas Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Richardson is 7:00-7:29 AM, when 14.4% of commuters leave home, compared with 15.3% across Texas. Early starts are less common than in Texas: 6.4% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 14.9% there. The morning rush looks much like Texas's: 48.6% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 47.9% there. About 1 in 3 commuters (29.6%) 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 Richardson, 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 Richardson 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 Richardson next to Texas 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	Richardson	Texas	United States
2009	7:55 AM	7:32 AM	7:37 AM
2010	7:55 AM	7:32 AM	7:38 AM
2011	7:59 AM	7:32 AM	7:38 AM
2012	7:58 AM	7:32 AM	7:38 AM
2013	7:59 AM	7:32 AM	7:39 AM
2014	7:59 AM	7:32 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:59 AM	7:31 AM	7:38 AM
2016	7:56 AM	7:31 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:53 AM	7:30 AM	7:38 AM
2018	7:53 AM	7:30 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:54 AM	7:30 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:56 AM	7:31 AM	7:37 AM
2021	7:59 AM	7:31 AM	7:37 AM
2022	8:04 AM	7:32 AM	7:37 AM
2023	8:04 AM	7:33 AM	7:38 AM
2024	8:05 AM	7:33 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Richardson were on the road by 8:05 AM, 10 minutes later than in 2009 (7:55 AM). The shift is sharper than across Texas, where the typical start moved 1 minute later. Commuters in Richardson now leave 27 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 Richardson has moved 11 minutes later. The 2024 release is the latest typical start for Richardson in the whole series.

How does Richardson's commute time compare?

Metric	Richardson	Texas	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	22.2 min	22.8 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	08:00 AM – 08:29 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM
Work From Home	24.6%	14.4%	15.0%
Walked	2.9%	1.5%	2.4%
Public Transit	1.7%	0.9%	3.2%

The average commute time in Richardson is 22.2 minutes, shorter than the 22.8 minutes in Texas.

1.7% commute by public transit, higher than the 0.9% in Texas. 2.9% commute by walking, higher than the 1.5% in Texas.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau

Richardson, TX Commute Compared With Nearby Cities

Richardson, TX is typical in size for this group, 115,321 residents against a local median of 129,550, so the measures below are close to a like for like comparison. Richardson, TX's one-way commute, at 22.2 min, runs 18% below the 27.0 min typical of the cities around it. That is the better end of the local range on this measure.

The cities themselves spread 9.4 min on one-way commute, so Richardson, TX sits at one end of an already wide local range rather than apart from it. Richardson, TX has the 2nd lowest one-way commute of the 5 areas compared here.

Area	Population	One-way commute	Work from home	Typical departure
Richardson, TX	115,321	22.2 min #2/5	24.6% #3/5	8:05 AM #5/5
Plano, TX	290,173	22.9 min	27.6%	8:03 AM
Garland, TX	238,307	31.0 min	12.4%	7:33 AM
Murphy, TX	20,156	31.4 min	32.6%	8:02 AM
Addison, TX	20,794	22.0 min	24.0%	8:03 AM

Frequently Asked Questions

Common questions about commuting in Richardson, Texas.

Is living in Richardson, Texas good for avoiding long commute costs?

Commuters here spend an estimated 185 hours a year on the road, worth roughly $5,740 at a typical national wage. That's 3% less than the typical Texas commuter spends.

When is peak congestion during the morning commute in Richardson, Texas?

Traffic peaks between 07:00 AM – 07:29 AM in Richardson, Texas. Leaving before or after this window is the single easiest way to avoid the heaviest local congestion, though 08:00 AM – 08:29 AM also sees a secondary bump.

How much money can remote workers save in Richardson, Texas?

About 24.6% of workers here already work from home. Working from home just 2 days a week in Richardson would save about 74 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $2,296 at the same national wage assumption used above.