Noise Levels in Garden Home-Raleigh Hills, Portland, OR | Find Quiet Neighborhoods With Our Sound Map
52 dBA
Average noise across Garden Home-Raleigh Hills
Quiet office to normal conversation
726
Residents above the EPA 55 dBA threshold
24% of Garden Home-Raleigh Hills residents
68 dBA
Loudest residential point
Highway traffic 50 ft away
This map shows modeled outdoor noise across Garden Home-Raleigh Hills 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.
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 726 Garden Home-Raleigh Hills residents, or 23.5%, live above that level. By land area, 36.5% of Garden Home-Raleigh Hills is above 55 dBA.
63.5% below 55 dBA
36.5% above 55 dBA
See how noise in Garden Home-Raleigh Hills compares to similar-sized neighborhoods.
Noise by Part of Garden Home-Raleigh Hills
Average noise levels for Garden Home-Raleigh Hills residents, grouped by direction from the center of Garden Home-Raleigh Hills. Western Garden Home-Raleigh Hills carries the highest population-weighted average; Central Garden Home-Raleigh Hills carries the lowest. Just 9% of residents in Central Garden Home-Raleigh Hills live in blocks above the EPA's 55 dBA threshold, a third of the share in Western Garden Home-Raleigh Hills.
Central Garden Home-Raleigh Hills
49.6 dBA · Mostly quiet
Quiet office
Eastern Garden Home-Raleigh Hills
53.1 dBA · Moderate-loud
Quiet office to normal conversation
Northern Garden Home-Raleigh Hills
53.2 dBA · Moderate-loud
Quiet office to normal conversation
Southern Garden Home-Raleigh Hills
51.7 dBA · Moderate
Quiet office to normal conversation
Western Garden Home-Raleigh Hills
54.6 dBA · Moderate-loud
Quiet office to normal conversation
Western Garden Home-Raleigh Hills sounds about 41% louder than Central Garden Home-Raleigh Hills to the human ear, a 5.0 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
53 dBA
Quiet office to normal conversation
330 ft
45 dBA
Quiet suburban street at night
660 ft
36 dBA
Soft rainfall
¼ mile
35 dBA
Soft rainfall
½ mile
35 dBA
Soft rainfall
Calculated from the model's calibrated attenuation formula. About 32% of Garden Home-Raleigh Hills sits under tree canopy (much heavier than most neighborhoods) and roughly 37% 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
Portland International (PDX) sits northeast of Garden Home-Raleigh Hills. 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 Garden Home-Raleigh Hills, particularly to the southwest, show no measurable aviation contribution. Use the Aviation toggle on the map above to isolate the airport's footprint.
How Noise Is Distributed Across Garden Home-Raleigh Hills
The bar chart below shows the share of Garden Home-Raleigh Hills residents in each noise band. About 82% of residents live below the EPA's 55 dBA threshold, and roughly 1% live in blocks above 60 dBA. Long-term exposure in that range is linked to elevated stress hormones and cardiovascular risk.
How Garden Home-Raleigh Hills Compares
Garden Home-Raleigh Hills sits the lowest among the peer group. Below: how Garden Home-Raleigh Hills's average outdoor noise and share of residents above the EPA threshold compare with Denny Whitford, Homestead, Lake Forest, and Raleigh West.
Average noise level (dBA)
Garden Home-Raleigh Hills's 52.2 dBA pop-weighted average is the lowest among the peer group. Oregon as a whole averages 52.9 dBA and the U.S. averages 52.0 dBA. Both are lower than Garden Home-Raleigh Hills because most of either area is rural land away from major roads.
Share of residents above 55 dBA
About 23.5% of Garden Home-Raleigh Hills 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, 36.5% of Garden Home-Raleigh Hills's footprint sits above 55 dBA, against a Oregon average of 24.2% and a national average of 28.1%.
What This Means if You're Moving to Garden Home-Raleigh Hills
- 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 32% of Garden Home-Raleigh Hills is under tree cover (much heavier than most neighborhoods), and the dominant land cover is low-density developed open space. 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. Portland International's approach paths concentrate aviation noise to the northeast. Neighborhoods to the southwest of downtown show no measurable contribution from the airport.
