A new tool is available that could provide some interesting truths about noise and traffic in Boston. Although it is still in its early stages of development, Total Home Score is a resource designed for prospective home buyers or renters to better understand hidden factors that may ultimately impact their decisions about where to live. Liberty Mutual and Solaria Labs are behind the burgeoning effort.
The site uses two categories for location scores: a quiet score and a road score. The quiet score is dependent upon noise levels in the surrounding area, taking into account busy roads, highways, trains, and more, whereas the road score reviews data on speeding cars and aggressive driving to determine ones ability to enjoy activities like walking, biking, or jogging with greater peace of mind.
We decided to plug some North End locations into to the site. The search results are shown below.
North End Quiet Scores:
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the areas highlighted in red seem to be located close to the highways. You can see the North Street red zones are close by the Callahan Tunnel and the red zone at Legends Way is right near 93.
In addition, there seem to be a few areas around Hanover Street also shown in red.
North End Road Scores:
The neighborhood scores well in road score category. As shown below, even the areas with a slightly yellow tint by the Garden still have an above average score. Good news for pedestrians and bikers!
As of now, the site does not have data on pedestrian noise, but perhaps this is a feature that will come as the site is further developed. More to come!
The day they took traffic off the elavated highway was like the day when they turned the sound off. I think you have to live over the tunnels to hear them. Pedestrian noise you know about when they wake you from a sound sleep. Count how much sleep you loose and you can give your own score. What would be good app is one that showes the police calls on a property.
Would you show maps of Aquarium, Harbor Garage and Atlantic Ave?
Thanks, Mary
You can do this by falling the link in the article. It takes out to a site where you can type in the address of the harbor garage or one that is close by and show you the map.