I somehow feel that having a backyard does not justify leaving before your child wakes up and returning after he goes to bed.
I only have a 45min commute and I still only get to spend around 1 to 2 hours with my kids during the week. Some days I'm too tired to even make best use of my time with them. I'm currently looking for a new job in London which will put my commute just shy of "extreme commuting" knowing I might not see much - if any - of my kids during the week. But I can live with that because of the opportunities it creates for our family and the most valuable time I spend with them is the days I don't work anyway.
My first career was in education, I worked with and saw many kids with a breadwinning parent who was absent most of the week, and they generally developed on the same spectrum as parents of equally present two parent households.
Anecdotally, my mother worked extremely long hours from her first child (I'm the youngest of my siblings by a decade) until I was a teenager, I routinely only saw her to say goodbye in the morning and on weekends. My siblings and I all ended up pretty far ahead on any developmental scale you choose, even though we basically only saw her on weekends.
I would gladly work longer hours but see less of him during the week if it means I get more days off because the time I spend with him will be more positive overall.
If I can either spend $3000 a month on a for a tiny two bedroom apartment 30 minutes from work. Or spend half that and get a bigger house with a yard, and have to commute an extra hour. You bet I am going to take that extra commute. There is less pollution, less noise, and just as good an education system. And that is $18,000 a year that can be spent on family vacations, college, or retirement.
Then again I am a second generation commuter, and that is just how life is to me. So maybe I have it wrong.