Noise Levels in Juanita, Kirkland, WA | Find Quiet Neighborhoods With Our Sound Map

53 dBA
Average noise across Juanita
Quiet office to normal conversation
4,531
Residents above the EPA 55 dBA threshold
34% of Juanita residents
69 dBA
Loudest residential point
Highway traffic 50 ft away

This map shows modeled outdoor noise across Juanita 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
Juanita, Kirkland, WA Map of Noise Levels in Juanita
Click the map to explore
35 45 55 70 90
Quietest (dBA) Loudest
Colorblind friendly off

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 4,531 Juanita residents, or 33.9%, live above that level. By land area, 35.1% of Juanita is above 55 dBA.

See how noise in Juanita compares to similar-sized neighborhoods.

Noise by Part of Juanita

Average noise levels for Juanita residents, grouped by direction from the center of Juanita. Northern Juanita carries the highest population-weighted average; Western Juanita carries the lowest. Just 14% of residents in Western Juanita live in blocks above the EPA's 55 dBA threshold, a third of the share in Northern Juanita.

Central Juanita

54.6 dBA · Moderate-loud
Quiet office to normal conversation

47% of people above 55 dBA

QuietLoud

Eastern Juanita

52.0 dBA · Moderate
Quiet office to normal conversation

29% of people above 55 dBA

QuietLoud

Northern Juanita

55.9 dBA · Moderate-loud
Quiet office to normal conversation

48% of people above 55 dBA

QuietLoud

Southern Juanita

51.7 dBA · Moderate
Quiet office to normal conversation

17% of people above 55 dBA

QuietLoud

Western Juanita

49.4 dBA · Mostly quiet
Quiet office

14% of people above 55 dBA

QuietLoud

Northern Juanita sounds about 57% louder than Western Juanita to the human ear, a 6.5 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 100TH Ave NE do you need to be?

100TH Ave NE produces an estimated 66 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
66 dBA
Busy restaurant
165 ft
54 dBA
Quiet office to normal conversation
330 ft
46 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 38% of Juanita sits under tree canopy (much heavier than most neighborhoods) and roughly 45% 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

Seattle-Tacoma International (SEA) sits south of Juanita. 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 Juanita, particularly to the north, show no measurable aviation contribution. Use the Aviation toggle on the map above to isolate the airport's footprint.

How Noise Is Distributed Across Juanita

The bar chart below shows the share of Juanita residents in each noise band. About 70% of residents live below the EPA's 55 dBA threshold, and roughly 6% live in blocks above 60 dBA. Long-term exposure in that range is linked to elevated stress hormones and cardiovascular risk.

How Juanita Compares

Juanita sits at the quieter end of the spectrum. Below: how Juanita's average outdoor noise and share of residents above the EPA threshold compare with Education Hill, Bridle Trails, Wallingford, and Lake Hills.

Average noise level (dBA)

Juanita's 53.0 dBA pop-weighted average is at the quieter end of the spectrum. Washington as a whole averages 51.3 dBA and the U.S. averages 52.0 dBA. Both are lower than Juanita because most of either area is rural land away from major roads.

Share of residents above 55 dBA

About 33.9% of Juanita 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, 35.1% of Juanita's footprint sits above 55 dBA, against a Washington average of 27.7% and a national average of 28.1%.

What This Means if You're Moving to Juanita

  • 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 100TH Ave NE 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 38% of Juanita is under tree cover (much heavier than most neighborhoods), 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. Seattle-Tacoma International's approach paths concentrate aviation noise to the south. Neighborhoods to the north 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.

Federal datasets used:

FHWA Highway Performance Monitoring System: road geometry, traffic counts, lane configuration
U.S. DoT Bureau of Transportation Statistics National Transportation Noise Map: aviation and rail noise, road calibration ground truth
USGS / MRLC National Land Cover Database: land cover and impervious surface coverage
USDA Forest Service Tree Canopy Cover: vegetation density for sound propagation
U.S. Census Bureau TIGER/Line: block-level geography and population
U.S. EPA Levels Document: 55 dBA outdoor reference level

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.