Bellingham, WA Noise Levels
Bellingham, WA: what the federal noise map shows
Bellingham, WA reads 47.5 dB(A) on BTS's 24-hour average, inside HUD's "Acceptable" noise zone, 65 dB(A) day-night average or below under 24 CFR 51.104, the federal government's own line for building housing with no extra sound attenuation required. Road traffic drives that number here, not the other two sources. That figure is sampled at one coordinate, the Census Bureau's own internal point for Bellingham, not a street-by-street survey of the whole place.
Bellingham's noise, by source
Each of the three transportation modes gets its own model from BTS; the combined figure above is what they add up to.
What this means for a house here
Upgraded windows, door seals and STC-rated glazing meaningfully cut broadband, near-continuous road noise.
Where Bellingham ranks
Among the 3,622 US places in this dataset with any measurable transportation noise, Bellingham ranks 1,842, loudest first. By population, it ranks 362 of the 12,137 places in this dataset, home to about 95,860 people.
Your street may differ from Bellingham's reading
For a single house or lot in Bellingham rather than the town-wide figure above, BTS's own map is the same free source, queried directly.
More on how this number was built
For exactly which federal dataset feeds Bellingham's figure, see the methodology guide. Since road traffic is what's driving this reading, the guide to what actually cuts each kind of noise covers the fix that fits.