This map shows modeled outdoor noise across Madison 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 238,597 Madison residents, or 38.9%, live above that level. By land area, 33.7% of Madison is above 55 dBA.
See how noise in Madison compares to similar-sized cities.
Noise by Part of Madison
Average noise levels for Madison residents, grouped by direction from the center of Madison. The highest population-weighted average is in the downtown Madison area (eastern Madison); the lowest is in the Wisconsin Dells area (northwestern Madison), where just 16% of residents live in blocks above the EPA's 55 dBA threshold, a third of the share in the loudest section.
Downtown Madison
51% of people above 55 dBA
Stoughton & McFarland
46% of people above 55 dBA
Fitchburg, Oregon & Monroe
25% of people above 55 dBA
Waunakee, Portage & DeForest
16% of people above 55 dBA
Wisconsin Dells
16% of people above 55 dBA
To the human ear, noise in the downtown Madison area (eastern Madison) sounds about 56% louder than in the Wisconsin Dells area (northwestern Madison), a 6.4 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.
Loudest Road Corridors
The model evaluates every road in Madison using federal traffic counts, posted speeds, heavy-truck ratios, and pavement type. The source level shown is the modeled noise at the road centerline, where it is loudest. Noise drops with distance, faster in vegetated areas and slower over open pavement.
How far back from IH 039N do you need to be?
IH 039N 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.
Calculated from the model's calibrated attenuation formula. About 21% of Madison sits under tree canopy (about average for cities) and roughly 31% 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.
Rail Noise
Active freight rail runs through parts of Madison. 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
Dane County Regional/Truax Field (MSN) sits northeast of Madison. 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 85 dBA on the map's Overall layer. Blocks on the opposite side of Madison, 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 Madison
The bar chart below shows the share of Madison residents in each noise band. About 52% of residents live below the EPA's 55 dBA threshold, and roughly 12% live in blocks above 60 dBA. Long-term exposure in that range is linked to elevated stress hormones and cardiovascular risk.
How Madison Compares
Madison sits at the quieter end of the spectrum. Below: how Madison's average outdoor noise and share of residents above the EPA threshold compare with Janesville, Milwaukee, Racine, and Fond Du Lac.
Average noise level (dBA)
Madison's 54.0 dBA pop-weighted average is at the quieter end of the spectrum. Wisconsin as a whole averages 53.0 dBA and the U.S. averages 52.0 dBA. Both are lower than Madison because most of either area is rural land away from major roads.
Share of residents above 55 dBA
About 38.9% of Madison 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, 33.7% of Madison's footprint sits above 55 dBA, against a Wisconsin average of 29.6% and a national average of 28.1%.
What This Means if You're Moving to Madison
- 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 IH 039N 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 21% of Madison 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. Dane County Regional/Truax Field's approach paths concentrate aviation noise to the northeast. Neighborhoods to the southwest 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.