Photo: Michael Rivera · CC BY-SA 3.0For about two in five of its working residents, Lake Park is a commute to Valdosta
Measured by household income, Lake Park is behind 86% of U.S. towns. For jobs and income Lake Park is better than 8% of U.S. towns (D); for walkability it is more walkable than 15% of U.S. towns (D). Only 2% work in Lake Park itself; outside it, Valdosta draws the most (44%, 13 miles).
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2024, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
Getting to work from Lake Park, in brief
Where Lake Park’s Jobs & income grade comes from
Job access by car holds Lake Park’s grade up (ahead of 32% of U.S. towns); the poverty rate pulls it down (31.1%, U.S. 12.5%).
Unemployment (0.0%) is left out: Lake Park’s labor force is under 1,000, too few workers for a steady figure.
A fairly firm grade. Within the Census margins of error for income and poverty, Lake Park could be anywhere from D− to C+.
Out of Lake Park to work: where people go
Where Lake Park clocks in
44% of workers
2% of workersLines run between town centers. The top 10 towns each way; “Everywhere else” is the rest, including other states.
A thicker line means more commuters. Switch between where residents work and where the people who work here live.
Who leaves Lake Park for work, and who comes in
On a workday 332 residents head out to work, 7 work right here, and 289 people come in from elsewhere.
About as many people by day as by night: the people who leave are replaced by the people who come in.
About as many jobs as working residents (0.87 per resident).
Workday population = residents − those who work elsewhere + those who come in (the Census “commuter-adjusted” method). Residents: Census survey; commuters: LEHD 2024, primary jobs.
34% of the jobs in Lake Park make or build things
296 jobs are based in Lake Park.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Lake Park, 2014 → 2024: 253 → 296. Big swings can come from how a large employer reports its locations, not only from real openings or closings.
Primary jobs covered by unemployment insurance (not the self-employed). Pay is monthly earnings. LEHD 2024.
Here is what they are, next to the jobs Lake Park’s own residents hold wherever they work.
From Lake Park, about 25 minutes to the job
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 7.9 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Lake Park workers work from home, vs 16% across Georgia. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 509 commuters (the 12% who work from home are left out). Across Georgia: 84% drive alone, 1% take transit; U.S.: 81% and 4%. Census ACS 2020–24.
From the Census survey of workers who don’t work from home.
Where in the region Lake Park works
About 23% show a job over 50 miles away. Some of that is real, and some is employers that report every worker at a head office, so a few long commutes are on paper only.
Straight-line distance from each worker’s home block to their main job’s block. LEHD 2024.
Every working resident’s trip, home to work, as the crow flies. Roads add to it, so real drives run longer.
Driving is how Lake Park gets around
The street layout scores higher than the way people actually get to work: hardly any commuters walk, bike or take transit, below the 3.1% across Georgia.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 576 workers.
How TownRatings grades walkability →
Transit service: no data. EPA’s transit file has no stops for most of this county (its agencies had not published schedules in the format EPA used in 2020). That is missing data, not a finding that there is no bus or train.
Households without a car (shown, not graded). 2.9% of Lake Park households have no vehicle (Georgia 5.9%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Lake Park’s commuters take a bus or train.
5,019th of 5,794: where Lake Park ranks among U.S. towns of 1,100 to 2,100
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Somerset MD | 1,151 | $250K | 1.9% | 2.3% | 1% | A+ |
| 2 | Chevy Chase Village MD | 1,978 | $250K | 1.2% | 2.6% | 1% | A+ |
| 3 | Bellerose NY | 1,169 | $232K | 1.6% | 6.1% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 18 | Berkeley Lake GA | 2,034 | $166K | 1.6% | 1.6% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 115 | Fairplay GA | 1,881 | $120K | 1.6% | 1.2% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 193 | Isle of Hope GA | 2,053 | $105K | 1.4% | 1.3% | 4% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 5,017 | Smackover AR | 1,584 | $56K | 26.6% | 7.4% | 14% | D |
| 5,018 | Bull Shoals AR | 1,888 | $42K | 14.6% | 12.9% | 10% | D |
| 5,019 | Lake Park GA | 1,559 | $52K | 31.1% | 0.0% | 2% | D |
| 5,020 | Hart MI | 2,065 | $51K | 21.3% | 6.1% | 21% | D |
| 5,021 | White Cloud MI | 1,548 | $45K | 15.1% | 7.0% | 9% | D |
| … | |||||||
| 5,794 | Paraje NM | 1,333 | $33K | 61.7% | 0.0% | 7% | D− |
Census ACS 2020–24 (income, poverty, unemployment), Census LEHD (work in town), TownRatings Jobs & income grades. Each town links to its Work & commute page.
Ranked on the Jobs & income grade: the towns either side of Lake Park, the top three, the last and three more from Georgia.
What this data can and can’t tell you
- Two sources, two years. Trips, distances and jobs based here: Census LEHD 2024, primary jobs, where the employer reports them. Income, poverty, unemployment, commute time and how people travel: Census ACS 2020–24 averages.
- Straight lines, older transit. Miles are as the crow flies. EPA’s walkability and transit files use 2017–20 inputs.
Jobs and commuting in Lake Park: questions
What is the median household income in Lake Park?
$51,813 (±$33,903) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $77,353 across Georgia and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Lake Park?
31.1%, against 13.4% across Georgia and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Lake Park?
25 minutes each way on average, against 28 across Georgia and 26 nationally. 12% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Lake Park work?
2% work in town.
Is Lake Park walkable?
Lake Park is more walkable than 15% of U.S. towns (Walkability D): an EPA walkability index of 6.1 out of 20, and 0% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Lake Park without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 3% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Lake Park, from the people who make the trip.
More of Lake Park
Flows, distances and jobs: U.S. Census Bureau, LEHD Origin-Destination Employment Statistics (LODES 8), 2024, primary jobs. Commute time, working from home and working out of state: U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 5-year estimates. Distances are straight lines between home and work; real drives run longer. Walkability index, job access and transit service: U.S. EPA Smart Location Database. The two grades are our own summaries of these figures, not official ratings.