Noise Levels in 90638, CA | Find Quiet Neighborhoods With Our Sound Map
54 dBA
Average noise across 90638
Quiet office to normal conversation
15,025
Residents above the EPA 55 dBA threshold
36% of 90638 residents
81 dBA
Loudest residential point
City bus interior
This map shows modeled outdoor noise across 90638 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 15,025 90638 residents, or 36.2%, live above that level. By land area, 43.0% of 90638 is above 55 dBA.
Average noise levels for 90638 residents, grouped by direction from the center of 90638. Northern 90638 carries the highest population-weighted average; Western 90638 carries the lowest. Just 33% of residents in Western 90638 live in blocks above the EPA's 55 dBA threshold, roughly the same as the share in Northern 90638.
Central 90638
55.2 dBA · Moderate-loud
Quiet office to normal conversation
70% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Eastern 90638
53.1 dBA · Moderate-loud
Quiet office to normal conversation
32% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Northern 90638
56.2 dBA · Moderate-loud
Normal conversation an arm’s length away
37% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Southern 90638
55.3 dBA · Moderate-loud
Quiet office to normal conversation
44% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Western 90638
51.8 dBA · Moderate
Quiet office to normal conversation
33% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Northern 90638 sounds about 36% louder than Western 90638 to the human ear, a 4.4 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 Santa Ana Fwy do you need to be?
Santa Ana Fwy produces an estimated 78 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
78 dBA
City bus interior
165 ft
64 dBA
Busy restaurant
330 ft
56 dBA
Normal conversation an arm’s length away
660 ft
48 dBA
Quiet office
¼ mile
41 dBA
Soft rainfall
½ mile
35 dBA
Soft rainfall
Calculated from the model's calibrated attenuation formula. About 8% of 90638 sits under tree canopy (lighter than most zip codes) and roughly 60% 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 90638. 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
John Wayne/Orange County (SNA) sits southeast of 90638. The U.S. Department of Transportation models aviation noise around this airport from federal traffic data, 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 65 dBA on the map's Overall layer. Blocks on the opposite side of 90638, particularly to the northwest, show no measurable aviation contribution. Use the Aviation toggle on the map above to isolate the airport's footprint.
How Noise Is Distributed Across 90638
The bar chart below shows the share of 90638 residents in each noise band. About 61% of residents live below the EPA's 55 dBA threshold, and roughly 15% live in blocks above 60 dBA. Long-term exposure in that range is linked to elevated stress hormones and cardiovascular risk.
How 90638 Compares
90638 sits the lowest among the peer group. Below: how 90638's average outdoor noise and share of residents above the EPA threshold compare with 90620, 92833, 90703, and 90604.
Average noise level (dBA)
90638's 53.7 dBA pop-weighted average is the lowest among the peer group. California as a whole averages 54.0 dBA and the U.S. averages 52.0 dBA. Both are lower than 90638 because most of either area is rural land away from major roads.
Share of residents above 55 dBA
About 36.2% of 90638 residents live in blocks where outdoor levels exceed the EPA's 55 dBA threshold. That's fewer than any of its peer group. Measured by land area instead, 43.0% of 90638's footprint sits above 55 dBA, against a California average of 36.0% and a national average of 28.1%.
What This Means if You're Moving to 90638
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 Santa Ana Fwy 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 8% of 90638 is under tree cover (lighter than most zip codes), and the dominant land cover is medium-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. John Wayne/Orange County's approach paths concentrate aviation noise to the southeast. Neighborhoods to the northwest 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.
