Richland Commute Time Map & Patterns

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

You 9/24/26, 4:28 PM

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

Map AI 9/24/26, 4:28 PM

Commute Time Burden in Richland: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Richland spend about 35 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 144 hours, about 6.0 full days, spent commuting. That is 23% less time on the road than the Washington average of 22.4 minutes each way, a difference of 5.1 minutes.

Richland holds about 0.8% of Washington's population but accounts for roughly 0.6% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in Richland would save about 58 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $1,785 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)
Richland	17.3 min	34.6 min	144 hrs/yr	$4,463	1,895
Washington	22.4 min	44.8 min	187 hrs/yr	$5,785	1,525
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.

Richland Commute Map

On average, it takes 17.3 minutes to get to work in Richland. That's 23% shorter than the 22.4-minute U.S. average.

The most common departure window is 07:30 AM – 07:59 AM, followed by 07:00 AM – 07:29 AM. Driving is the most common commute choice, followed by working from home. About 16.2% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Richland

Public transit is unusually rare in Richland: 5.1 times less than the Washington average (0.7% vs 3.4%).

Taking a taxi is unusually rare in Richland: 105500.0 times less than the Washington average (0.0% vs 0.1%).

Commute Mode Trends in Richland, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Richland 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	Bicycle	Other	Motorcycle	Taxi
2009	91.6%	3.0%	2.7%	1.3%	0.6%	0.3%	0.6%	0.0%
2010	91.0%	3.5%	2.5%	1.6%	0.5%	0.4%	0.5%	0.0%
2011	90.1%	3.8%	2.4%	1.6%	0.9%	0.5%	0.6%	0.0%
2012	89.7%	4.0%	2.8%	1.6%	0.7%	0.5%	0.5%	0.1%
2013	90.5%	3.8%	2.4%	1.5%	0.8%	0.6%	0.3%	0.1%
2014	91.1%	4.1%	2.2%	1.4%	0.7%	0.3%	0.2%	0.0%
2015	91.2%	3.8%	1.9%	1.1%	1.1%	0.5%	0.2%	0.0%
2016	92.0%	3.6%	1.8%	1.0%	0.8%	0.6%	0.2%	0.0%
2017	91.9%	4.4%	1.3%	0.7%	0.8%	0.6%	0.2%	0.1%
2018	91.5%	5.2%	1.2%	0.6%	0.8%	0.5%	0.2%	0.1%
2019	91.0%	5.3%	1.4%	0.6%	0.9%	0.5%	0.2%	0.0%
2020	88.1%	8.8%	1.3%	0.6%	0.5%	0.4%	0.2%	0.1%
2021	86.0%	11.2%	1.1%	0.8%	0.5%	0.3%	0.1%	0.1%
2022	83.6%	13.1%	1.5%	0.9%	0.4%	0.4%	0.1%	0.0%
2023	82.7%	14.4%	1.5%	0.6%	0.3%	0.4%	0.1%	0.0%
2024	81.2%	16.2%	1.0%	0.7%	0.6%	0.3%	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 2016 at 92.0%. Overall it fell from 91.6% in 2009 to 81.2% in 2024, down 10.4 percentage points. It has fallen in each of the last 8 releases.

Working from home gained the most ground in Richland: its share of workers rose from 3.0% in 2009 to 16.2% in 2024, up 13.2 percentage points. Most of that increase, 10.9 points, came in the releases after 2019, which include the pandemic years.

Walking lost the most ground, falling from 2.7% to 1.0% of workers (down 1.7 percentage points).

Commute Start Times in Richland

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Richland?

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

12:00-4:59 AM		7.7%
5:00-5:29 AM		5.0%
5:30-5:59 AM		7.2%
6:00-6:29 AM		8.8%
6:30-6:59 AM		8.6%
7:00-7:29 AM		12.7%
7:30-7:59 AM		14.9%
8:00-8:29 AM		10.4%
8:30-8:59 AM		5.2%
9:00-9:59 AM		5.0%
10:00-10:59 AM		2.8%
11:00-11:59 AM		1.6%
12:00-3:59 PM		4.4%
4:00-11:59 PM		5.9%

Richland Washington Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Richland is 7:30-7:59 AM, when 14.9% of commuters leave home, compared with 11.0% across Washington. Early starts are more common than in Washington: 19.9% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 17.6% there. The morning rush is more concentrated than in Washington: 46.5% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 43.1% there. About 1 in 5 commuters (19.6%) 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 Richland, 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 Richland 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 Richland next to Washington 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	Richland	Washington	United States
2009	7:32 AM	7:33 AM	7:37 AM
2010	7:28 AM	7:34 AM	7:38 AM
2011	7:26 AM	7:34 AM	7:38 AM
2012	7:27 AM	7:35 AM	7:38 AM
2013	7:26 AM	7:35 AM	7:39 AM
2014	7:24 AM	7:35 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:23 AM	7:34 AM	7:38 AM
2016	7:25 AM	7:34 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:23 AM	7:33 AM	7:38 AM
2018	7:23 AM	7:33 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:25 AM	7:33 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:26 AM	7:33 AM	7:37 AM
2021	7:26 AM	7:33 AM	7:37 AM
2022	7:27 AM	7:33 AM	7:37 AM
2023	7:29 AM	7:34 AM	7:38 AM
2024	7:30 AM	7:35 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Richland were on the road by 7:30 AM, 1 minute earlier than in 2009 (7:32 AM). That goes against the trend across Washington, where the typical commuter now leaves 2 minutes later than in 2009. Commuters in Richland now leave 8 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 Richland has moved 6 minutes later.

How does Richland's commute time compare?

Metric	Richland	Washington	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	17.3 min	22.4 min	22.4 min
Departure Window	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM
Secondary Departure Window	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM
Work From Home	16.2%	19.8%	15.0%
Walked	1.0%	3.0%	2.4%
Public Transit	0.7%	3.4%	3.2%

The average commute time in Richland is 17.3 minutes, shorter than the 22.4 minutes in Washington.

0.7% commute by public transit, lower than the 3.4% in Washington. 1.0% commute by walking, lower than the 3.0% in Washington.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau

Richland, WA Commute Compared With Nearby Cities

How Richland, WA compares with the 2 cities closest to it.

Area	Population	One-way commute	Work from home	Typical departure
Richland, WA	59,474	17.3 min #1/3	16.2% #1/3	7:30 AM #3/3
Kennewick, WA	74,609	17.6 min	9.3%	7:27 AM
Pasco, WA	72,525	18.6 min	7.5%	7:16 AM

Frequently Asked Questions

Common questions about commuting in Richland, Washington.

How much does the average commute cost workers in Richland, Washington?

Commuters here spend an estimated 144 hours a year on the road, worth roughly $4,463 at a typical national wage. That's 23% less than the typical Washington commuter spends.

When is rush hour worst in Richland, Washington?

Traffic peaks between 07:30 AM – 07:59 AM in Richland, Washington. 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.

How common is public transit use in Richland, Washington?

Public transit usage is significantly lower here than typical: about 0.7% of commuters use it versus 3.4% in Washington, meaning a personal vehicle is essential for most workers.