Lyons has higher household incomes than 70% of U.S. towns
Transit is limited for a town this walkable: about 0.3 trips an hour stop near the typical resident at the evening peak, against 19.6 in Portland. 14.7% of residents live below the poverty line; Oregon has 11.9%. The two grades for Lyons are C+ for jobs and income and A for walkability.
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
What the numbers say about work in Lyons
Lyons makes and builds things
74% of the jobs based in Lyons are in goods: factories, construction and farms. Across the jobs Lyons residents hold, wherever they work, it’s 30%. The jobs ↓
Lyons and Salem trade workers both ways
Salem is the top workplace for Lyons residents (24%) and also where the most people who work in Lyons come from (21% of its jobs). The commute map ↓
Most jobs in Lyons pay over $40,000 a year
73% of the jobs based in Lyons pay over $3,333 a month (about $40,000 a year), the top earnings band in the Census data. The jobs ↓
Written from the Census figures on this page. Commute flows, distances and jobs are Census LEHD 2023, primary jobs only (the self-employed aren’t counted); commute time and working from home are from the Census American Community Survey; with 584 working residents, small shifts move the shares.
Why Lyons gets the Jobs & income grade it does
On income, poverty and job access, Lyons is better than 38% of U.S. towns. Household income holds Lyons’ grade up ($91,875, U.S. $80,734); job access by car pulls it down (ahead of 27% of U.S. towns).
Unemployment (8.8%) is left out: Lyons’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, Lyons could be anywhere from C− to B+.
Factories, building and farms: 74% of the jobs in Lyons
387 jobs are based in Lyons.
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Lyons, 2013 → 2023: 438 → 387. 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 2023.
Here is what they are, next to the jobs Lyons’s own residents hold wherever they work.
24% of working residents work in Salem
Where Lyons clocks in
24% of workers
11% of workers
4% 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.
In and out of Lyons on a workday
On a workday 561 residents head out to work, 23 work right here, and 364 people come in from elsewhere.
About 1,000 people are in Lyons on a workday afternoon, 16% fewer than live here.
0.66 jobs for every working resident, so most people commute out.
Workday population = residents − those who work elsewhere + those who come in (the Census “commuter-adjusted” method). Residents: Census survey; commuters: LEHD 2023, primary jobs.
About 29 minutes to work from Lyons
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 9.1 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Lyons workers work from home, vs 19% across Oregon. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 388 commuters (the 18% who work from home are left out). Across Oregon: 80% drive alone, 3% take transit; U.S.: 81% and 4%. Census ACS 2020–24.
From the Census survey of workers who don’t work from home.
Short hops and long hauls from Lyons
About 16% 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 2023.
Every working resident’s trip, home to work, as the crow flies. Roads add to it, so real drives run longer.
In Lyons, walking beats the bus
On EPA’s walkability index and the share of commuters who walk, bike or take transit, Lyons is more walkable than 87% of U.S. towns. Both inputs place Lyons near the same point nationally.
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 471 workers.
How TownRatings grades walkability →
Transit service (shown, not graded). Nearly all residents live within a ¾-mile walk of a bus or train stop, 0% within a quarter mile. At the weekday evening rush, about 0.3 trips an hour stop near the typical resident, more than in 47% of the 9,825 U.S. towns with transit data.
Transit at the evening rush trips an hour stopping within ¼ mile of the typical resident, EPA 2020
Households without a car (shown, not graded). 2.7% of Lyons households have no vehicle (Oregon 7.1%, U.S. 8.4%). 0% of Lyons’ commuters take a bus or train.
How Lyons ranks: 2,257th of 4,866 U.S. towns of 900 to 1,700
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Somerset MD | 1,151 | $250K | 1.9% | 2.3% | <1% | A+ |
| 2 | Bellerose NY | 1,169 | $232K | 1.6% | 6.1% | 1% | A+ |
| 3 | Baxter Estates NY | 1,014 | $154K | 1.0% | 3.1% | 1% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 161 | Stafford OR | 1,600 | $163K | 6.9% | 5.0% | 1% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 168 | Coburg OR | 1,373 | $98K | 1.5% | 8.9% | 5% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 266 | Aurora OR | 1,113 | $108K | 6.1% | 2.1% | 1% | A |
| … | |||||||
| 2,255 | Surry ME | 1,692 | $75K | 7.0% | 4.8% | 2% | C+ |
| 2,256 | Warm Springs CA | 1,673 | $70K | 24.0% | 7.3% | <1% | C+ |
| 2,257 | Lyons OR | 1,226 | $92K | 14.7% | 8.8% | 4% | C+ |
| 2,258 | Juniata Township MI | 1,546 | $69K | 8.2% | 2.1% | 1% | C+ |
| 2,259 | New Lisbon NY | 1,084 | $85K | 8.5% | 1.8% | 1% | C+ |
| … | |||||||
| 4,866 | Oglala SD | 1,071 | $21K | 68.8% | 26.5% | 0% | 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 Lyons, the top three, the last and three more from Oregon.
What this data can and can’t tell you
- Two sources, two years. Trips, distances and jobs based here: Census LEHD 2023, 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 Lyons: questions
What is the median household income in Lyons?
$91,875 (±$23,109) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $83,011 across Oregon and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Lyons?
14.7%, against 11.9% across Oregon and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Lyons?
29 minutes each way on average, against 23 across Oregon and 26 nationally. 18% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Lyons work?
4% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Salem (24%, 22 mi), Stayton (11%, 9 mi), Albany (4%, 26 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Lyons walkable?
Lyons is more walkable than 87% of U.S. towns (Walkability A): an EPA walkability index of 9.7 out of 20, and 6% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Lyons without a car?
0% of commuters take transit and 3% of households have no car. 0% of residents live within a quarter mile of a stop.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Lyons, from the people who make the trip.
More of Lyons
Flows, distances and jobs: U.S. Census Bureau, LEHD Origin-Destination Employment Statistics (LODES 8), 2023, 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.