Noise Levels in Forest Heights, MD | Find Quiet Neighborhoods With Our Sound Map
58 dBA
Average noise across Forest Heights
Normal conversation an arm’s length away
1,024
Residents above the EPA 55 dBA threshold
56% of Forest Heights residents
82 dBA
Loudest residential point
Food blender at arm’s length
This map shows modeled outdoor noise across Forest Heights 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 1,024 Forest Heights residents, or 56.1%, live above that level. By land area, 56.8% of Forest Heights is above 55 dBA.
Average noise levels for Forest Heights residents, grouped by direction from the center of Forest Heights. Western Forest Heights carries the highest population-weighted average; Central Forest Heights carries the lowest. Just 42% of residents in Central Forest Heights live in blocks above the EPA's 55 dBA threshold, about two-thirds of the share in Western Forest Heights.
Central Forest Heights
56.3 dBA · Moderate-loud
Normal conversation an arm’s length away
42% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Eastern Forest Heights
61.0 dBA · Loud
Normal conversation an arm’s length away
100% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Western Forest Heights
62.4 dBA · Loud
Busy restaurant
71% of people above 55 dBA
QuietLoud
Western Forest Heights sounds about 53% louder than Central Forest Heights to the human ear, a 6.1 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 I-95 do you need to be?
I-95 produces an estimated 79 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 suburban street at night.
At source
79 dBA
City bus interior
165 ft
66 dBA
Highway traffic 50 ft away
330 ft
59 dBA
Normal conversation an arm’s length away
660 ft
51 dBA
Quiet office to normal conversation
¼ mile
44 dBA
Quiet suburban street at night
½ mile
36 dBA
Soft rainfall
Calculated from the model's calibrated attenuation formula. About 36% of Forest Heights sits under tree canopy (about average for cities) and roughly 29% 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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Airport Noise
Ronald Reagan Washington Ntl (DCA) sits northwest of Forest Heights. 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 50 dBA on the map's Overall layer. Blocks on the opposite side of Forest Heights, particularly to the southeast, show no measurable aviation contribution. Use the Aviation toggle on the map above to isolate the airport's footprint.
How Noise Is Distributed Across Forest Heights
The bar chart below shows the share of Forest Heights residents in each noise band. About 49% of residents live below the EPA's 55 dBA threshold, and roughly 42% live in blocks above 60 dBA. Long-term exposure in that range is linked to elevated stress hormones and cardiovascular risk.
How Forest Heights Compares
Forest Heights sits the highest among the peer group. Below: how Forest Heights's average outdoor noise and share of residents above the EPA threshold compare with Morningside, Fairmount Heights, Landover Hills, and Edmonston.
Average noise level (dBA)
Forest Heights's 58.1 dBA pop-weighted average is the highest among the peer group. Maryland as a whole averages 52.3 dBA and the U.S. averages 52.0 dBA. Both are lower than Forest Heights because most of either area is rural land away from major roads.
Share of residents above 55 dBA
About 56.1% of Forest Heights 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, 56.8% of Forest Heights's footprint sits above 55 dBA, against a Maryland average of 32.9% and a national average of 28.1%.
What This Means if You're Moving to Forest Heights
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 I-95 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 36% of Forest Heights is under tree cover (about average for cities), 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. Ronald Reagan Washington Ntl's approach paths concentrate aviation noise to the northwest. Neighborhoods to the southeast 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.
