Urbandale, IA: how dark is the sky here?

Satellite radiance puts Urbandale in the inner-city band. Among the brightest skies in this dataset. Usually just the Moon and a few of the brightest stars or planets cut through. Only 98.7% of the 3,206 cities measured here read darker than Urbandale.

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.

How far Urbandale is from a meaningfully darker sky

Clive, IA, about 2 miles away as the crow flies, measures in the suburban band, one step darker than Urbandale. Actual driving distance will run longer than that straight-line figure.

Clive, IA is itself still a measured city, not a designated dark-sky park, this only compares against the 3,206 places this dataset covers.

How Urbandale compares nationally

About 47,759 people live in Urbandale, IA, sized enough to appear in this dataset of 3,206 incorporated US cities. Urbandale places 3,147 of 3,206 cities in this dataset's darkest-to-brightest order.