Information from a NC Department of Transportation study presented recently at a work session of the Guilford County Board of Commissioners presents quite a detailed look at traffic and commuting patterns in Guilford County.

What’s the average daily commute time for workers who still head to the office? If you said 22.4 minutes, then you got it exactly right.

How many of the roughly 550,000 county residents stay and work within the county?  That would be 211,905.

How many commute to a different county for work? 44,256.

Those numbers are very specific, however, in reality they are the best guess based on the study’s findings.

According to the study results, 8.7 percent of Guilford County residents work from home.  The pandemic has, of course, made that a popular choice and, post-pandemic, many people in Guilford County, and across the country for that matter, don’t want to return to the office – at least not five days a week.

 Guilford County government employees, to take one example, have started a strong push for county officials to allow them to work more from home when their jobs allow it. County detention officers, for instance, are still going to be stuck with coming down to a county jail no matter what.

Not many people walk to work in Guilford County, but some do.  According to the study, 1.8 percent of those who commute to work do so by walking.

Even fewer people ride a bike to the office or workplace.  Only one-fifth of 1 percent of the workers use that method of transportation.

Likewise, only a small percentage of workers in the county get to work on public transportation.  Only 1.5 percent of workers do it that way.

And what’s the most common way to get to work?  By motorized vehicle, of course. Over 87 percent of county worker get to work that way –  78.6 percent of workers drive alone to the workplace, while 8.2 percent carpool.