Traffic…A Matter of Perspective
As our community continues to grow, one thing we hear quite often is “there is a lot of traffic in Morristown.” Typically, I hear this from people who have never ventured to Knoxville or Nashville as personally, I feel Morristown is busy, but traffic is a strong word for what we have.
We can see increased traffic counts, but an interesting statistic is the Mean Commute Time compiled by the census. This number is tracked yearly for all commuters working in Hamblen County yet living anywhere. Going back to 2010, prior to the great carwash period, the average commune time to work in Hamblen County was 20.58 minutes. We saw a peak in 2016 of 22.23 minutes and the latest recoded time is 22.20 minutes at the end of 2023.
To us at the Chamber, these numbers are in no way a shock as Hamblen County has been busy for 50 years. Our definition of “busy” may move east or west depending on development, but don’t be confused. If you have $1 in your left pocket and $1 in your right, you still have $2. You can move money between those pockets or even get crazy and carry it in your sock, but you still have $2.
As Morristown and Hamblen County continues to continue to grow, there is no doubt we will see “traffic” increase, but rest assured, we are a few hundred years away from being in that Knoxville level of traffic.