Fayette County Commute Time Map & Patterns

Commute Time Burden in Fayette County: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in Fayette County spend about 47 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 194 hours, about 8.1 full days, spent commuting. That is 8% more time on the road than the West Virginia average of 21.6 minutes each way, a difference of 1.7 minutes.

Fayette County holds about 2.2% of West Virginia's population but accounts for roughly 2.4% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in Fayette County would save about 78 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $2,407 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)
Fayette County	23.3 min	46.6 min	194 hrs/yr	$6,018	1,230
West Virginia	21.6 min	43.2 min	180 hrs/yr	$5,581	1,052
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: West Virginia Counties

Compare commute times among different counties

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On average, it takes 23.3 minutes to get to work in Fayette County. That's 4% longer 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 6.6% work from home.

How People Get to Work in Fayette County

• Car: 89.3%
• Worked at Home: 6.6%
• Walked: 2.8%
• Other: 1.1%
• Taxi: 0.1%
• Public Transportation: < 0.1% unusually low
• Motorcycle: < 0.1% unusually low
• Bicycle: < 0.1% unusually low

Riding a motorcycle is essentially absent in Fayette County, versus 0.0% in West Virginia.

Public transit is unusually rare in Fayette County: 208369510.5 times less than the West Virginia average (0.0% vs 0.5%).

Biking is essentially absent in Fayette County, versus 0.2% in West Virginia.

Commute Mode Trends in Fayette County, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in Fayette 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
• Taxi
• Public Transportation
• Motorcycle
• Bicycle

Show commute mode data by year

Year	Car	Worked at Home	Walked	Other	Taxi	Public Transportation	Motorcycle	Bicycle
2009	93.2%	3.5%	3.0%	0.1%	0.0%	0.2%	0.0%	0.0%
2010	92.4%	3.6%	3.3%	0.5%	0.0%	0.1%	0.0%	0.0%
2011	92.2%	3.5%	3.5%	0.7%	0.0%	0.2%	0.0%	0.0%
2012	91.4%	2.7%	4.1%	1.1%	0.0%	0.2%	0.3%	0.0%
2013	91.7%	1.9%	4.1%	1.8%	0.0%	0.1%	0.3%	0.0%
2014	91.1%	1.9%	3.6%	3.1%	0.0%	0.1%	0.3%	0.0%
2015	90.7%	1.6%	4.0%	3.4%	0.0%	0.1%	0.2%	0.0%
2016	90.7%	1.7%	3.5%	3.7%	0.0%	0.2%	0.2%	0.0%
2017	90.8%	1.9%	3.1%	3.9%	0.0%	0.2%	0.0%	0.0%
2018	91.2%	1.9%	2.9%	3.7%	0.0%	0.3%	0.0%	0.1%
2019	91.3%	2.3%	3.2%	2.8%	0.0%	0.4%	0.0%	0.1%
2020	91.2%	3.5%	2.7%	2.3%	0.0%	0.3%	0.0%	0.1%
2021	90.0%	4.5%	3.0%	2.2%	0.0%	0.2%	0.0%	0.1%
2022	89.9%	5.1%	3.2%	1.7%	0.0%	0.1%	0.0%	0.0%
2023	89.5%	6.1%	2.8%	1.3%	0.2%	0.1%	0.0%	0.0%
2024	89.3%	6.6%	2.8%	1.1%	0.1%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%

Driving was the most common way to get to work in every release from 2009 to 2024. Overall its share fell from 93.2% in 2009 to 89.3% in 2024, down 3.9 percentage points. It has fallen in each of the last 5 releases.

Working from home gained the most ground in Fayette County: its share of workers rose from 3.5% in 2009 to 6.6% in 2024, up 3.1 percentage points. Most of that increase, 4.3 points, came in the releases after 2019, which include the pandemic years.

Walking peaked at 4.1% in 2012 and has since fallen back to 2.8%.

Commute Start Times in Fayette County

What Time Do People Leave for Work in Fayette County?

The bars show when commuters in Fayette 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 West Virginia for comparison. Hover over or tap a row for the exact numbers.

12:00-4:59 AM	12:00-4:59 AM Fayette County6.0% West Virginia6.3%	6.0%
5:00-5:29 AM	5:00-5:29 AM Fayette County3.1% West Virginia4.4%	3.1%
5:30-5:59 AM	5:30-5:59 AM Fayette County6.4% West Virginia5.6%	6.4%
6:00-6:29 AM	6:00-6:29 AM Fayette County7.7% West Virginia10.2%	7.7%
6:30-6:59 AM	6:30-6:59 AM Fayette County6.9% West Virginia10.4%	6.9%
7:00-7:29 AM	7:00-7:29 AM Fayette County16.9% West Virginia14.4%	16.9%
7:30-7:59 AM	7:30-7:59 AM Fayette County11.9% West Virginia11.9%	11.9%
8:00-8:29 AM	8:00-8:29 AM Fayette County10.3% West Virginia9.7%	10.3%
8:30-8:59 AM	8:30-8:59 AM Fayette County5.2% West Virginia4.5%	5.2%
9:00-9:59 AM	9:00-9:59 AM Fayette County5.2% West Virginia4.7%	5.2%
10:00-10:59 AM	10:00-10:59 AM Fayette County1.2% West Virginia2.7%	1.2%
11:00-11:59 AM	11:00-11:59 AM Fayette County0.9% West Virginia1.2%	0.9%
12:00-3:59 PM	12:00-3:59 PM Fayette County8.5% West Virginia7.0%	8.5%
4:00-11:59 PM	4:00-11:59 PM Fayette County9.7% West Virginia7.1%	9.7%

Fayette County West Virginia Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in Fayette County is 7:00-7:29 AM, when 16.9% of commuters leave home, compared with 14.4% across West Virginia. Early starts are about as common as in West Virginia: 15.5% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 16.3% there. The morning rush looks much like West Virginia's: 46.0% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 46.4% there. About 1 in 4 commuters (25.5%) 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 Fayette 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 Fayette 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 Fayette County next to West Virginia 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.

• Fayette County
• West Virginia
• United States

Show typical departure times by year

Year	Fayette County	West Virginia	United States
2009	7:38 AM	7:35 AM	7:37 AM
2010	7:36 AM	7:35 AM	7:38 AM
2011	7:31 AM	7:34 AM	7:38 AM
2012	7:28 AM	7:34 AM	7:38 AM
2013	7:23 AM	7:33 AM	7:39 AM
2014	7:22 AM	7:32 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:21 AM	7:32 AM	7:38 AM
2016	7:22 AM	7:32 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:22 AM	7:32 AM	7:38 AM
2018	7:21 AM	7:31 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:21 AM	7:31 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:23 AM	7:29 AM	7:37 AM
2021	7:28 AM	7:28 AM	7:37 AM
2022	7:34 AM	7:29 AM	7:37 AM
2023	7:39 AM	7:28 AM	7:38 AM
2024	7:37 AM	7:27 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in Fayette County were on the road by 7:37 AM, almost exactly the same as in 2009. Across West Virginia, meanwhile, the typical commuter now leaves 8 minutes earlier than in 2009. Commuters in Fayette County now leave at about the same time as the typical American commuter (7:38 AM). Since the 2019 release, which covers the years just before the pandemic, the typical start in Fayette County has moved 16 minutes later.

How does Fayette County's commute time compare?

Metric	Fayette County	West Virginia	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	23.3 min	21.6 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	6.6%	9.1%	15.0%
Walked	2.8%	2.5%	2.4%
Public Transit	< 0.1%	0.5%	3.2%

The average commute time in Fayette County is 23.3 minutes, longer than the 21.6 minutes in West Virginia.

0.0% commute by public transit, lower than the 0.5% in West Virginia. 2.8% commute by walking, higher than the 2.5% in West Virginia.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau