UK Travel Time Maps

Esri has a created a series of isochrone maps for the BBC showing how far you can drive in the Friday evening rush hour in ten major UK cities. The Friday Night Rush includes ten maps showing travel distances in the UK's most populous cities on an average Friday evening.

Each map shows the average distance you can travel in an hour when leaving the centre of each city at 4pm, 7pm and 10pm on a Friday evening. The travel distances for each map were calculated using data from HERE's traffic speed predictions. These predictions are themselves based on up up to three years of historic data.


If you don't work in the exact geographical centre of one of the UK's ten most populaous cities then you could try TravelTime instead. TravelTime is a very handy tool for working out how far you can travel in different set times. It allows you to find areas you can reach by walking, cycling, driving or accessing by public transport in a defined amount of time.

If you share your location with TravelTime you can view an isochrone map showing you how far you can travel using different lengths of time. For example,  you can select to view all the places you could walk to within 15 minutes. TravelTime also allows you to search for venues and points of interest within your allocated travel time. So, for example, you can ask TravelTime to show you all the coffee shops within a 15 minute walk of your current location.

TravelTime also allows you to search from more than one location. So, for example, if you want to meet a friend for coffee you can enter both your locations and find the areas which you can both reach within a 15 minute walk.


TimeToAnywhere is another interactive map which shows you how far you can drive in the UK for different lengths of time. The map is very easy to use. Just click on the map to set your location and you can instantly view an isochrone layer showing the driving times from your selected location.

The stand out feature of TimeToAnywhere is its speed (drag the marker around the map to see how quickly the isochrone layer updates). However TimeToAnywhere also includes a number of other useful features. These include an option to view the isochrone layer for busy commuting times (when driving times are longer). The map also includes an option to view a route and travel time to a specific location, by dragging a destination marker onto the map.

Not everybody who commutes is traveling to work. Some commuters are traveling to schools. I think those people are called students.

If you are looking for a new school and don't want an over-long journey each way then you could use Parallel's Schools in England & Wales. This interactive map provides, walking, cycling and driving times for every school in England and Wales. Zoom in on any school and you can view isochrone layers showing the areas that you can walk, bike or drive to (or from) the school in six minute intervals.