Marchetti’s Constant is a proven principle of urban design that shows the average time a person spends commuting each day, an approximate total of one hour. [ref] That’s thirty minutes to work and thirty minutes back home.

The fascinating thing is that this principle has been historically proven time and again. Regardless of the mode of transportation, people consistently take 30 minutes to travel to work. Whether they were walking, riding on horseback, taking a buggy, driving a car or riding on the latest bullet train, it’s always 30 minutes. For urban planners, this pattern has huge implications as it drives population density in urban and suburban areas because people are unlikely to move beyond a fixed radius of distance from their place of employment.

What difference does this principle make for you and I as we lead in the local church?

The vast majority of churches in our country are deeply impacted by car travel. It’s one of those facts of daily life that is so obvious for most of us that we don’t think about it. There was a time when most people walked to their local parish, but that norm changed as the car became more widespread. This reality is important for us to remember as our churches are affected by both the communities we serve as well as their transportation choices.

Here are a few ways that Marchetti’s Constant can impact your church today:

Campus Expansion Should Be Within 30 Minutes of Your Existing Site(s).

Considering the evidence of Marchetti’s Constant, it shouldn’t surprise you that statistically speaking the vast majority of multisite church campuses are found within 30 minutes of the other locations. According to the latest Leadership Network research on the multisite movement:

* 44% of campuses are 15 minutes or less in terms of travel time between each location. * 45% of multisite locations are between 15 and 30 minutes of each other.

This means that 89% of all multisite campuses are within the Marchetti window.

Multisite campus expansion needs to be a regional impact strategy rather than something that allows your church to reach far distances. We often focus on the few “name brand” churches who have started campuses two or three states away; however, these few examples push against the normal trend society.

Prevailing multisite “hive” leadership teams use an existing location to build their volunteer core. (Statistically, they most often use the original location.) If you attempt to locate your new campus outside the 30-minute Marchetti window, you will have a harder time finding a large enough critical mass to acquire the team you need.

I’ve chatted with a number of entrepreneurial Lead Pastors over the years who have talked about wanting to start a campus “over there” (somewhere 1+ hours away). While the desire to flex some missionary zeal is noble, it really works against the built-in dynamics of your community.

Start your campus expansion strategy by looking at every community within 30 minutes of your location today. You can expand from there as your locations spread but don’t miss the opportunity to reach people within that primary “drive time.”

Your Mass Media Promotion Should Be Narrowly Focused.