In the mornings, I leave early to workout at the company gym. (Not true at the moment, because all gyms are closed in my area right now.) That commute gives me time to wake up and get into the gym mindset.
After work, it gives me time to unwind, let go of the stress for the day, and get into my dad-of-4 mindset.
Without it, everything blends together. My work days would never really start and never really end.
Mine's 45m-1h to work, and 1h-2h home in a city with notoriously awful traffic design and flow. It's basically just 5 miles of gridlock. In the heavy urban traffic I find it actually _adds_ a lot of stress to my day--it definitely feels like a mad max style survival adventure more than anything.
I used to commute 45 minutes each way on a nice dual line divided highway with very light traffic. Barring the odd blizzard, I found it like you describe... A great chance to let my mind switch states between home/work. And it was nice to have an hour and a half every day where I _couldn't_ beat up on myself for not being productive and could actually just truly sit and enjoy listening to a podcast or something.
This is very important to me. It helps me forget about work when heading home and vice versa. I also like talking to people in person at the office more than relying on Zoom watercooler rooms.