More than 120,000 Bay Area residents spend at least 3 hours commuting every day, study says

Click through this slideshow for the cities where residents have the longest commutes. Click through this slideshow for the cities where residents have the longest commutes. Photo: Santiago Mejia / The Chronicle Photo: Santiago Mejia / The Chronicle Image 1 of / 29 Caption Close More than 120,000 Bay Area residents spend at least 3 hours commuting every day, study says 1 / 29 Back to Gallery

If you live in San Francisco, Oakland or Hayward, there is a 4.8 percent chance you spend at least 90 minutes getting to work, and another 90 getting back. That works out to about 95,600 people crowding onto BART trains and clogging up the highways every day, according to a new study on working trends.

Your commute is likely somewhat gentler in the South Bay. According to the Apartment List study, compiled from 2017 American Community Survey microdata, 3 percent of folks in San Jose (24,840 people), Sunnyvale and Santa Clara take more than 90 minutes to get to work. The study did not include data for the North Bay or greater East Bay.

It's worse just beyond the edges of the Bay Area. Stockton and Lodi, located about 80 miles east of San Francisco, have the highest share of super commuters (people with one-way commutes over 90 minutes) in the country: over 11 percent of their combined populations.

Modesto, 90 miles southeast of San Francisco, falls just behind Stockton, with 8.7 percent of its population driving more than 90 minutes to work each day.

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The study doesn't specify where the Stockton and Modesto folks are traveling, but one can assume they're headed to the Bay Area, the closest major job hub.

The data aren't altogether surprising. The Bay Area, with its proliferation of high-paying jobs and egregious housing costs, is a breeding ground for super commuters, a phenomenon that has increased throughout the region in recent years.

What is surprising is that super commuters, per the national average, earn 20.9 percent more than the median American worker employed full-time with a commute under 90 minutes. The highest earners are "significantly" more likely to have a super commute, the study found. One in 23 people earning more than $100,000 in the nation are considered super commuters.

Indeed, super commuters tend to work in high-wage industries and live in high-wage metros, which necessitate long commute times. But, even in the same metro area or occupation category, the super commuter tends to earn 15 percent more than the average worker.

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A possible explanation: Super commuters are statistically more likely to own their homes, and "unique commuting patterns may be driven either by a desire to purchase a home or remain in one's home, even as job opportunities arise," the study's authors write.

Beyond the tech industry, the bulk of super commuters work in extraction and construction — two fields that pay well but often require immense travel time (to an oil field or mine, for example).

The rise of the super commuters has far-reaching effects, stretching far beyond the individual's inconvenience. Long commutes can create problems for everyone – increasing traffic and costing cities billions.

According to a 2017 study by INRIX, the Bay Area has one of the nastiest commutes in the country. The study estimated that idling in traffic cost individual drivers $2,250 and San Francisco $10.6 billion in 2017 (INRIX found these figure by calculating the direct and indirect costs from the traffic jams).

Additionally, the more time people spend in their cars, the greater the amount of fuel emissions pumped into the atmosphere, which scientists say contributes to global climate change.

Read Michelle Robertson's latest stories and send her news tips at mrobertson@sfgate.com.

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