Pandemic Saves New York Commuters 13% Of Their Work Week: Report

Among workers of all U.S. states, New York workers have gained the most time back from their commutes by working from home during the pandemic, according to a new report from car-shopping app CoPilot.

New York workers spent an average of 12.9 percent of their work week, or 5.7 hours per week, on their commute prior to the pandemic.

In the new report, "Cities That Gained the Most Time Back From Their Commutes," not only does New York top the state rankings, New York City heads the rankings for largest cities. One other city in the state, Yonkers, also made it into top 10 in the report. Yonkers comes in No. 7 on the rankings of mid-sized cities and saved commuting time.

Although the amount of time that the average person spent commuting had been steadily increasing nationwide, the predominant shift to remote work in 2020 is reversing this trend —possibly for the long-term, the car-buyer support company researchers concluded.

Across the United States, newly-remote workers have gained an average 10.4 percent of their work week back, according to the report.

However, regions like the New York metro area are more likely to have gained significant time back from their commutes than others. Remote workers in coastal states like New York, California, and Maryland gained the most time back, while those in central states like Wyoming, South Dakota, and North Dakota are likely saving less time, the report said.

Commuting has long been a dominant factor of Hudson Valley life. The Marist Bureau of Economic Research reported last year that more than half of all Hudson Valley residents who held a job commuted to work, and more than 43 percent of working Hudson Valley residents went to jobs in New York City.

The patterns had held steady for several years — up until the pandemic.

To find out which cities are gaining the most time back from not having to commute, researchers at CoPilot analyzed data from the U.S. Census Bureau and calculated what percentage of the average work week was spent commuting to and from work prior to the pandemic. To improve relevance, cities were further categorized by population: small (less than 150,000 people), midsize (between 150,000 and 349,999 people), and large (350,000 people or more).