Noise Levels in Avon Hill, Cambridge, MA | Find Quiet Neighborhoods With Our Sound Map
57 dBA
Average noise across Avon Hill
Normal conversation an arm’s length away
4,514
Residents above the EPA 55 dBA threshold
66% of Avon Hill residents
68 dBA
Loudest residential point
Highway traffic 50 ft away
This map shows modeled outdoor noise across Avon Hill 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 4,514 Avon Hill residents, or 65.6%, live above that level. By land area, 68.8% of Avon Hill is above 55 dBA.
Average noise levels for Avon Hill residents, grouped by direction from the center of Avon Hill. Northern Avon Hill carries the highest population-weighted average; Central Avon Hill carries the lowest. Just 59% of residents in Central Avon Hill live in blocks above the EPA's 55 dBA threshold, three-quarters of the share in Northern Avon Hill.
Central Avon Hill
56.5 dBA · Moderate-loud
Normal conversation an arm’s length away
59% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Eastern Avon Hill
58.4 dBA · Loud
Normal conversation an arm’s length away
100% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Northern Avon Hill
60.5 dBA · Loud
Normal conversation an arm’s length away
82% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Southern Avon Hill
58.0 dBA · Loud
Normal conversation an arm’s length away
58% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Western Avon Hill
58.3 dBA · Loud
Normal conversation an arm’s length away
92% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Northern Avon Hill sounds about 32% louder than Central Avon Hill to the human ear, a 4.0 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 do you need to be?
produces an estimated 68 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
68 dBA
Highway traffic 50 ft away
165 ft
55 dBA
Quiet office to normal conversation
330 ft
47 dBA
Quiet office
660 ft
39 dBA
Soft rainfall
¼ mile
35 dBA
Soft rainfall
½ mile
35 dBA
Soft rainfall
Calculated from the model's calibrated attenuation formula. About 24% of Avon Hill sits under tree canopy (heavier than most neighborhoods) and roughly 55% 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 Avon Hill. 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
General Edward Lawrence Logan International (BOS) sits east of Avon Hill. 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 75 dBA on the map's Overall layer. Blocks on the opposite side of Avon Hill, particularly to the west, show no measurable aviation contribution. Use the Aviation toggle on the map above to isolate the airport's footprint.
How Noise Is Distributed Across Avon Hill
The bar chart below shows the share of Avon Hill residents in each noise band. About 20% of residents live below the EPA's 55 dBA threshold, and roughly 29% live in blocks above 60 dBA. Long-term exposure in that range is linked to elevated stress hormones and cardiovascular risk.
How Avon Hill Compares
Avon Hill sits at the quieter end of the spectrum. Below: how Avon Hill's average outdoor noise and share of residents above the EPA threshold compare with West Cambridge, East Watertown, Aggasiz-Harvard, and Brookline Village Commercial District.
Average noise level (dBA)
Avon Hill's 57.4 dBA pop-weighted average is at the quieter end of the spectrum. Massachusetts as a whole averages 54.3 dBA and the U.S. averages 52.0 dBA. Both are lower than Avon Hill because most of either area is rural land away from major roads.
Share of residents above 55 dBA
About 65.6% of Avon Hill 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, 68.8% of Avon Hill's footprint sits above 55 dBA, against a Massachusetts average of 40.0% and a national average of 28.1%.
What This Means if You're Moving to Avon Hill
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 24% of Avon Hill is under tree cover (heavier than most neighborhoods), 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. General Edward Lawrence Logan International's approach paths concentrate aviation noise to the east. Neighborhoods to the west 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.
