Photo: Famartin · CC BY-SA 4.0Household incomes in Front Royal trail those of 66% of U.S. towns
For jobs and income Front Royal is better than 28% of U.S. towns (C); for walkability it is more walkable than 74% of U.S. towns (B+). Poverty touches 14.3% of residents, next to 9.9% for Virginia as a whole. 9% of workers work from home (Virginia 18%).
Census ACS 2020–24, Census LEHD 2023, EPA Smart Location Database. How the two grades are made
The commute and the jobs: Front Royal in brief
Front Royal trades workers with the towns around it
Front Royal has about as many jobs (6,449) as working residents (7,459), but they are mostly different people: 6,066 residents leave for work each day while 5,056 people come in. Only 22% of the jobs in Front Royal are held by people who live here. Day and night ↓
No single place dominates Front Royal’s commute
The biggest draw, Winchester, gets only 6% of working residents, and 64% work outside the top ten towns entirely. Front Royal residents fan out across the region. The commute map ↓
Front Royal draws workers from far and wide
The 6,449 jobs in Front Royal are filled from a wide area. Front Royal’s own residents hold 22% and the ten next-biggest home towns 12%; the other 66% come from many towns beyond those. The commute map ↓
Front Royal workers spend longer getting to work
The average trip takes 33 minutes each way, against 27 across Virginia. Over a year that’s about 253 hours of commuting, 46 more than the state’s typical worker. Time on the road ↓
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.
How Front Royal earns its Jobs & income grade
All four inputs sit close together, so no single one decides Front Royal’s grade.
A rough placement. Within the Census margins of error for income, poverty and unemployment, Front Royal could be anywhere from D to B−.
Who leaves, who stays, who comes in
On a workday 6,066 residents head out to work, 1,393 work right here, and 5,056 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 (0.86 per resident).
Workday population = residents − those who work elsewhere + those who come in (the Census “commuter-adjusted” method). Residents: Census survey; commuters: LEHD 2023, primary jobs.
6% of working residents work in Winchester
Where Front Royal clocks in
6% 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.
Time on the road from Front Royal: about 33 minutes
Round trip, about 230 workdays a year: roughly 10.5 full days in the car, bus or train.
Average commute minutes, one way
of Front Royal workers work from home, vs 18% across Virginia. Their commute is the hallway.
Share of the 6,615 commuters (the 9% who work from home are left out). Across Virginia: 83% 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.
The 6,449 jobs based in Front Royal
What kind of work
What it pays
Who does it
Jobs based in Front Royal, 2013 → 2023: 6,586 → 6,449. 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 Front Royal’s own residents hold wherever they work.
How far Front Royal’s workers travel
About 29% 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 Front Royal, most people drive to work
A firm grade. EPA’s index has no published margin of error; the commuting share comes from a Census survey of 7,258 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). 9.5% of Front Royal households have no vehicle (Virginia 6.1%, U.S. 8.4%). <1% of Front Royal’s commuters take a bus or train.
Out of 2,109 U.S. towns of 11,000 to 21,000, Front Royal comes 1,714th on jobs and income
| # | Town | People | Household income | Poverty | Unemployment | Work in town | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | New Albany OH | 11,803 | $238K | 1.4% | 0.9% | 11% | A+ |
| 2 | Plain Township OH | 13,257 | $219K | 2.1% | 0.8% | 10% | A+ |
| 3 | Rogers MN | 15,606 | $159K | 1.9% | 1.2% | 10% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 8 | Wolf Trap VA | 15,858 | $250K | 3.1% | 2.0% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 20 | Wakefield VA | 11,930 | $238K | 1.8% | 2.9% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 32 | Franconia VA | 18,335 | $152K | 2.8% | 2.7% | 2% | A+ |
| … | |||||||
| 1,712 | Worthington MN | 13,979 | $62K | 17.6% | 3.8% | 34% | C |
| 1,713 | Bloomsburg PA | 13,375 | $52K | 26.5% | 7.9% | 15% | C |
| 1,714 | Front Royal VA | 15,722 | $65K | 14.3% | 5.0% | 19% | C |
| 1,715 | Whitehall OH | 19,805 | $52K | 16.4% | 8.8% | 5% | C |
| 1,716 | Rutland VT | 15,363 | $58K | 15.3% | 4.4% | 41% | C |
| … | |||||||
| 2,109 | Douglas AZ | 16,038 | $42K | 27.8% | 12.3% | 29% | 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 Front Royal, the top three, the last and three more from Virginia.
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 Front Royal: questions
What is the median household income in Front Royal?
$64,838 (±$8,242) (Census ACS 2020–24), against $93,170 across Virginia and $80,734 nationally.
What is the poverty rate in Front Royal?
14.3%, against 9.9% across Virginia and 12.5% nationally (Census ACS 2020–24).
How long is the commute from Front Royal?
33 minutes each way on average, against 27 across Virginia and 26 nationally. 9% of workers work from home.
Where do people who live in Front Royal work?
19% work in town. The top destinations elsewhere are Winchester (6%, 17 mi), Washington (2%, 63 mi), Arlington (2%, 58 mi) (Census LEHD 2023).
Is Front Royal walkable?
Front Royal is more walkable than 74% of U.S. towns (Walkability B+): an EPA walkability index of 8.5 out of 20, and 3% of commuters walk, bike or take transit.
Can you get around Front Royal without a car?
<1% of commuters take transit and 10% of households have no car. EPA has no transit data for this county.
Commuter talk
Getting to work from Front Royal, from the people who make the trip.
More of Front Royal
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.