Noise Levels in 78721, TX | Find Quiet Neighborhoods With Our Sound Map
54 dBA
Average noise across 78721
Quiet office to normal conversation
2,692
Residents above the EPA 55 dBA threshold
35% of 78721 residents
76 dBA
Loudest residential point
City bus interior
This map shows modeled outdoor noise across 78721 at 100-meter resolution, combining road, aviation, and rail sources. Green areas measure below 45 dBA. Orange and red exceed the EPA's 55 dBA outdoor threshold linked to long-term health effects. Use the layer toggles to view each source on its own or all together.
Overall
Road
Rail
Aviation
Click the map to explore
35 dBa55 dBa (EPA limit)90+ dBa
3545557090
Quietest (dBA)Loudest
Colorblind friendlyoff
What the numbers sound like
30 dBAWhisper
40 dBASoft rainfall
45 dBAQuiet suburban street at night
50 dBAQuiet office
55 dBAEPA outdoor threshold: light traffic 100 ft away
60 dBANormal conversation an arm's length away
65 dBABusy restaurant
70 dBAHighway traffic 50 ft away
80 dBACity bus interior
Population Above the EPA Outdoor Threshold
The EPA's 55 dBA outdoor reference level is a common benchmark for residential noise exposure, especially for activity interference, annoyance, and long-term community noise concerns. About 2,692 78721 residents, or 34.7%, live above that level. By land area, 50.3% of 78721 is above 55 dBA.
Average noise levels for 78721 residents, grouped by direction from the center of 78721. Southern 78721 carries the highest population-weighted average; Northern 78721 carries the lowest. Just 27% of residents in Northern 78721 live in blocks above the EPA's 55 dBA threshold, about two-thirds of the share in Southern 78721.
Central 78721
54.5 dBA · Moderate-loud
Quiet office to normal conversation
45% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Eastern 78721
54.7 dBA · Moderate-loud
Quiet office to normal conversation
30% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Northern 78721
52.9 dBA · Moderate
Quiet office to normal conversation
27% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Southern 78721
55.9 dBA · Moderate-loud
Quiet office to normal conversation
45% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Western 78721
53.1 dBA · Moderate-loud
Quiet office to normal conversation
24% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Southern 78721 sounds about 23% louder than Northern 78721 to the human ear, a 3.0 dBA gap. Every 10 dBA roughly doubles perceived loudness. Within any of these directions, two homes a quarter mile apart can still differ by 10 or more dBA depending on how close they sit to a major highway.
How far back from E Ben White Blvd do you need to be?
E Ben White Blvd produces an estimated 55 dBA at its loudest centerline points. Noise drops logarithmically with distance, with the exact rate depending on what's between you and the road. Tree cover, walls, terrain, and pavement type all matter. At roughly a quarter mile back, traffic fades into the noise level of a soft rainfall.
At source
55 dBA
Quiet office to normal conversation
165 ft
41 dBA
Quiet suburban street at night
330 ft
35 dBA
Soft rainfall
660 ft
35 dBA
Soft rainfall
¼ mile
35 dBA
Soft rainfall
½ mile
35 dBA
Soft rainfall
Calculated from the model's calibrated attenuation formula. About 26% of 78721 sits under tree canopy (about average for zip codes) and roughly 34% is impervious surface like pavement and rooftops. Both are folded into the per-place decay rate above. Heavier canopy pulls noise down faster with distance; impervious surfaces slow the drop.
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Rail Noise
Active freight rail runs through parts of 78721. For most blocks the rail-only contribution is small. Combined road-plus-rail noise rarely exceeds road noise on its own. The exceptions are the handful of blocks within roughly a quarter mile of the right-of-way during pass-through hours.
Use the Rail toggle on the map above to isolate rail's contribution from road and aviation.
Airport Noise
Austin-Bergstrom International (AUS) sits south of 78721. The U.S. Department of Transportation measures aviation noise around this airport directly, and the model uses those federal measurements rather than synthetic predictions.
Blocks under the approach and departure paths carry combined road-plus-aviation noise, with some exceeding 55 dBA on the map's Overall layer. Blocks on the opposite side of 78721, particularly to the north, show no measurable aviation contribution. Use the Aviation toggle on the map above to isolate the airport's footprint.
How Noise Is Distributed Across 78721
The bar chart below shows the share of 78721 residents in each noise band. About 68% of residents live below the EPA's 55 dBA threshold, and roughly 4% live in blocks above 60 dBA. Long-term exposure in that range is linked to elevated stress hormones and cardiovascular risk.
How 78721 Compares
78721 sits the highest among the peer group. Below: how 78721's average outdoor noise and share of residents above the EPA threshold compare with 78751, 78733, 78756, and 78730.
Average noise level (dBA)
78721's 54.4 dBA pop-weighted average is the highest among the peer group. Texas as a whole averages 50.8 dBA and the U.S. averages 52.0 dBA. Both are lower than 78721 because most of either area is rural land away from major roads.
Share of residents above 55 dBA
About 34.7% of 78721 residents live in blocks where outdoor levels exceed the EPA's 55 dBA threshold. That's in the middle of its peer group. Measured by land area instead, 50.3% of 78721's footprint sits above 55 dBA, against a Texas average of 22.8% and a national average of 28.1%.
What This Means if You're Moving to 78721
Distance from highways matters more than the neighborhood name. Two homes in the same zip code can differ by 20 dBA if one sits 100 meters from E Ben White Blvd and the other 500 meters away. The model captures this at 100-meter resolution, so noise exposure changes block by block.
Tree canopy can help reduce modeled noise exposure. Roughly 26% of 78721 is under tree cover (about average for zip codes), and the dominant land cover is low-intensity developed land. Both are measured from federal USDA Forest Service and USGS satellite imagery at 30-meter resolution. Streets with 60% or higher canopy show 3 to 5 dBA lower noise than comparable streets with bare ground or pavement, which is why the per-place decay rate above already accounts for it.
Airport noise is directional. Austin-Bergstrom International's approach paths concentrate aviation noise to the south. Neighborhoods to the north of downtown show no measurable contribution from the airport.
Sources & Methodology
The BestNeighborhood noise model is calibrated against nearly one million federal ground-truth measurements across four states. Road noise is computed from segment-level federal traffic data and propagated outward using physics-based acoustic decay, with attenuation rates that depend on the surrounding land cover.
All inputs are published federal datasets. Block-level noise is computed by combining road, rail, and aviation sound sources in the energy domain, the same physics used in professional environmental noise assessments. Read the full methodology.
