Noise Levels in 79097, TX | Find Quiet Neighborhoods With Our Sound Map
52 dBA
Average noise across 79097
Quiet office to normal conversation
363
Residents above the EPA 55 dBA threshold
47% of 79097 residents
89 dBA
Loudest residential point
Lawnmower at 1 m
This map shows modeled outdoor noise across 79097 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 363 79097 residents, or 47.3%, live above that level. By land area, 23.3% of 79097 is above 55 dBA.
Average noise levels for 79097 residents, grouped by direction from the center of 79097. Central 79097 carries the highest population-weighted average; Southern 79097 carries the lowest. Just 3% of residents in Southern 79097 live in blocks above the EPA's 55 dBA threshold, a fifth of the share in Central 79097.
Central 79097
56.2 dBA · Moderate-loud
Normal conversation an arm’s length away
57% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Eastern 79097
53.9 dBA · Moderate-loud
Quiet office to normal conversation
45% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Northern 79097
48.7 dBA · Mostly quiet
Quiet office
34% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Southern 79097
43.9 dBA · Quiet
Quiet suburban street at night
3% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Western 79097
52.9 dBA · Moderate
Quiet office to normal conversation
74% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Central 79097 sounds about 135% louder than Southern 79097 to the human ear, a 12.3 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 do you need to be?
produces an estimated 89 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 quiet office.
At source
89 dBA
Lawnmower at 1 m
165 ft
75 dBA
City bus interior
330 ft
67 dBA
Highway traffic 50 ft away
660 ft
59 dBA
Normal conversation an arm’s length away
¼ mile
51 dBA
Quiet office
½ mile
42 dBA
Quiet suburban street at night
Calculated from the model's calibrated attenuation formula. About 0% of 79097 sits under tree canopy (much lighter than most zip codes) and roughly 26% 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 79097. 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.
How Noise Is Distributed Across 79097
The bar chart below shows the share of 79097 residents in each noise band. About 43% of residents live below the EPA's 55 dBA threshold, and roughly 3% live in blocks above 60 dBA. Long-term exposure in that range is linked to elevated stress hormones and cardiovascular risk.
How 79097 Compares
79097 sits the highest among the peer group. Below: how 79097's average outdoor noise and share of residents above the EPA threshold compare with 79039, 79019, 79068, and 79083.
Average noise level (dBA)
79097's 52.5 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 79097 because most of either area is rural land away from major roads.
Share of residents above 55 dBA
About 47.3% of 79097 residents live in blocks where outdoor levels exceed the EPA's 55 dBA threshold. That's more than any of its peer group. Measured by land area instead, 23.3% of 79097'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 79097
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 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 0% of 79097 is under tree cover (much lighter than most 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.
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.
