How pandemic relocations are snarling in-demand suburbs

For some people, working remotely opened up new lifestyle options. Many fled big cities, but they didn’t go very far. Will the resulting growth in suburbs and exurbs have lasting ripple effects?

Traffic congestion is back. But it may not be where you expected it. 

From New York to San Francisco, downtown streets are flowing a bit more freely in the morning than they did pre-pandemic. Drive out of town, though, and by lunchtime you could be snarled in suburban slowdowns that linger into the evening. 

It turns out that working from home doesn’t mean driving less. Far from it: In some suburbs, congestion is above pre-pandemic levels, as remote workers squeeze in weekday trips to shops, cafes, and clinics, jostling for space with armadas of delivery trucks. 

And for all last year’s hype about digital nomads giving up altogether on big cities and hanging out a shingle in rural idylls, what actually happened was a faster pace of centrifugal migration to suburbs and exurbs, where cars are often the only means of transportation. 

For these remote workers who potentially face a long future commute, the calculus is that employers won’t require their presence five days a week, so they get to enjoy their new surroundings and still stay connected to urban jobs and other amenities. 

“People are living not an hour away but an hour and a half away,” says Mitchell Moss, director of the Rudin Center for Transportation at New York University. “There’s a new recognition of the attraction of low density.”