Westchester Banks On Attracting More Reverse Commuters From NYC
As bridge-and-tunnel crowds stream into Manhattan each morning, a growing number of New Yorkers are heading the other way, reverse commuting to jobs beyond the city limits.
With new transit options and a growing, diversified economy, investors are betting on suburban commercial hubs’ ability to lure young talent living in the five boroughs, panelists said at Bisnow’s Westchester County State of the Market.
“CEOs drive where people work, and there are a lot of CEOs that have regional offices in Westchester that want to spend their Mondays and Fridays up here,” Rose Associates Director of Development Peter O'Keefe said during the event. “There's going to be a bump in commuters [living] in the city.”
Leading up to the pandemic, more than 157,000 people commuted into Westchester, over a quarter of the county’s workers, according to the most recent census data. The largest percentage came from the Bronx, with more than 38,000 workers.
Almost 9,000 residents commuted from Manhattan, 6,500 came from Queens and 3,000 from Brooklyn.
Though the Metro-North Railroad’s annual report does not include numbers for reverse commuters, data for the Long Island Rail Road, its regional counterpart, shows the morning ridership coming from the city increased 5.6% year-over-year in 2025.
Real estate players at Bisnow’s event, held at the Scarsdale Golf Club, said they expect reverse commuting to grow with the Penn Station Access project underway. The train extension will allow commuters to access the Metro-North line on both the East and West sides of Manhattan and add four more stations along the Hell Gate Line in the Bronx.
“Every time a transportation enhancement is made, it encourages development,” Westchester Deputy County Executive Joan McDonald said. “Now that we're looking at Penn Station, it's another opportunity for the reverse commuting public, for people who live in the Bronx and Manhattan, to come and work in Westchester.”
The county houses the headquarters of 170 companies, according to a report by the Business Council of Westchester. Businesses in the county employ 459,000 people, and incentives by the Westchester Development Corporation have helped create more than 1,500 jobs in the county since 2013.
Medical hubs may be among the fastest beneficiaries of increased access to the area. Hospitals and other facilities have rapidly expanded, hiring 90,000 people. Of the 11,000 local job openings, 36% were in the healthcare sector, according to an April 2025 report by Lohud.
New employment opportunities added since that report came out include a White Plains outpatient facility opened by New York Presbyterian in September and a new emergency department for White Plains Hospital.
Montefiore Hospital has a branch in New Rochelle, where the first Penn Access station in Westchester will be built. Three other medical campuses are located along the new Hell Gate line, currently under construction.
New Rochelle Development Commissioner Adam Salgado said he is working with Montefiore to create a community for employees coming from outside of Westchester.
Overall, he called the infrastructure project “an absolute game changer.”
“We're looking at a master-plan redevelopment of our train station complex to support this new ridership, this new person who's going to linger around New Rochelle,” Salgado said. “That's the first opportunity we have to make an impression on these new riders and entice them into our downtown to explore what we have to offer, so we see it really as a really strong catalyst for economic development.”
In Rye, the New York Blood Center opened a 187K SF campus as its $750M tower on the Upper East Side stalled. To attract the nonprofit, Westchester County’s Local Development Corporation approved tax-exempt bond financing for the 15-acre redevelopment in 2023.
“They do have a high number of reverse commuters,” McDonald said.
In the past, Westchester’s economy relied heavily on commuters into the five boroughs. Before the pandemic, approximately 92,000 of the county's 1 million residents commuted into the city, according to census data.
The outer boroughs and the suburbs benefited from New York City’s Covid-19-spurred exodus. Commuters to the city have returned as companies head to the office; however, many continue to work from home or from local offices.
“Seventy-five percent of our renters currently are relying on the Westchester economy,” O'Keefe said.
