Rolla, MO Night Sky Brightness
Rolla, MO: how dark is the sky here?
Satellite radiance puts Rolla in the suburban edge band. A noticeable glow near the horizon. Brighter stars and constellations are easy to pick out; the Milky Way is washed out. That's brighter than 26.8% of the 3,206 US cities in this dataset.
This comes from a satellite measuring light radiating upward, not a person's eyes on the ground, so it isn't the same as a Bortle class, though the two track each other closely - see the Bortle scale guide for where they can disagree.
Where to go for a darker sky near Rolla
The closest place in this dataset with a meaningfully darker sky is Union, MO, roughly 54 miles away in a straight line, rated rural. Road distance will be more.
Union, MO is itself still a measured city, not a designated dark-sky park, this only compares against the 3,206 places this dataset covers.
How Rolla compares nationally
About 20,660 people live in Rolla, MO, sized enough to appear in this dataset of 3,206 incorporated US cities. Rolla places 855 of 3,206 cities in this dataset's darkest-to-brightest order, ranked by the method in the methodology guide.