NJ drivers' mileage is nothing compared to other states

I saw some numbers this week that shocked me.

Maybe I’m the last one to know this, but did you? Did you know that even though New Jersey has hellaciously long commute times we are nowhere near the state that puts the most miles on their car?

Now I get that the long commute time is largely due to heavy traffic congestion and crawling speeds, traffic jams, etc. I suppose I just didn’t know how much so.

U.S. Census data shows New Jersey has the third worst commute times in the nation: 30.3 minutes each way on average. (Granted that’s grouping in mass transit, but even looking at only driving the number of minutes on average is 28.3.)

But here’s what’s crazy.

Forty states drive more miles per year than we do. 40!

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We are in the top 10 states for putting the least mileage on our cars yet we are third longest commute time-wise in the country. If that doesn’t underscore just how terrible traffic is here in the Garden State, then nothing does.

New Jersey drivers on average put 12,263 miles per year on their vehicles. Compare that to Virginia, 14,509. Or Maryland, 13,490. You want a real eye-opener?

The state putting the most miles on their vehicles is Wyoming at 24,069. Yet their commute time? 18 minutes. It’s all about how crowded the roads are.

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The mileage numbers come from trustedchoice.com.

If you want to see how we compare to other states, here’s the average number of miles driven in each state.

Alabama
17,817

Alaska
11,111

Arizona
13,090

Arkansas
17,224

California
12,524

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Colorado
12,899

Connecticut
12,117

Delaware
12,609

District of Columbia
7,013

Florida
14,557

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Georgia
18,334

Hawaii
11,688

Idaho
14,417

Illinois
12,581

Indiana
18,024

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Iowa
14,745

Kansas
14,781

Kentucky
16,305

Louisiana
14,951

Maine
14,215

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Maryland
13,490

Massachusetts
13,109

Michigan
14,307

Minnesota
17,909

Mississippi
19,966

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Missouri
18,521

Montana
15,880

Nebraska
14,836

Nevada
14,016

New Hampshire
11,570

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New Jersey
12,263

New Mexico
19,157

New York
10,167

North Carolina
16,073

North Dakota
17,671

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Ohio
14,278

Oklahoma
17,699

Oregon
12,218

Pennsylvania
11,445

Rhode Island
9,961

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South Carolina
14,941

South Dakota
15,541

Tennessee
15,287

Texas
16,172

Utah
15,516

Vermont
13,004

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Virginia
14,509

Washington
10,949

West Virginia
16,876

Wisconsin
15,442

Wyoming
24,069

(Shutterstock)

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Opinions expressed in the post above are those of New Jersey 101.5 talk show host Jeff Deminski only.

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