I too think the satellites don’t portray the true picture, I live in a valley in Wales halfway up one side overlooking a small town Risca, when out walking one night looking from the ridgeline down into Risca the LED streetlights aren’t that obvious. However, when you are on a more level plane the glare from them is very obvious. From Risca itself there is marked difference in the number of naked eye stars you can see compared with 200mtrs higher on the ridgeline, as for seeing the Milky Way, the only chance of that around here is the confectionary counter of Tesco.
In 2016 we went to Tivoli a small town in the hills 25km outside of Rome, looking up into the night sky I could only see 4 or 5 stars, the light pollution was horrendous.