Is Noise Pollution the Next Big Public-Health Crisis?
newyorker.com
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I'd certainly feel better about the irritating motorcycles if they were subsidizing all the quiet EVs. The bikers say the ear splitting noise is useful to improve safety? Okay, they can pay for it.
Like other forms of pollution we don't need to immediately stop all of it to make an improvement.
Now lets talk about dark skies...
So increasing registration tax based on noise level won't make much of a difference. You have to go after the aftermarket stuff.
I've had a really noisy bike (loud exhaust installed by previous owner) and a completely stock bike after that. I vastly prefer the stock exhausts. Quiet most of the time, made a nice sound when I really gave it the beans, but nothing excessive.
To be fair, those are illegal, but enforcement seems to be non-existent.
The SUV users say it improves safety. OK, they can pay for it.
The loud noise also presumably causes something of an arms race with more acoustically insulated, less fuel efficient, cars.
The eventual alternative is outright banning the noise. I think paying for some of that externality would be better.
> The riders intentionally choose a less safe form of transit and gain many benefits from doing so, including lower fuel and maintenance cost.
You've never actually owned or regularly ridden a motorcycle, have you?
They're as expensive, and often more expensive, to maintain than a car if they're your primary form of transport[1]. Service intervals tend to be much shorter (3750 - 10000 miles, depending on model), and tyres don't last anywhere near as long (2500 - 5000 miles, again, depending on the bike and the tyres). A new pair of good tyres (and you really want good tyres) is going to set you back about £300. When I was commuting 70 - 80 miles per day I was having to get my bike serviced and tyres replaced every 7 weeks.
The main reason I choose my bike over my car nine times out of ten is agency: I want to be able to decide how long a journey will take, not have it decided for me by the volume of traffic.
[1] Obviously this depends on the bike and car being compared, which can vary wildly - cheap(er) to run commuter bikes do exist, as per cars, but any kind of sports bike, mid-high end tourer, cruiser, roadster, etc., will probably have significant costs associated with maintenance.
But then, I wasn't keeping my bike in great tires/etc, and I wasn't commuting nearly as far as you.
(fwiw my current vehicle is approximately the loudest allowable per federal regulations, because I enjoy the sound it makes, not safety per say.)
I don't. The worst way to start my day is to be woken up by some moron revving their Harley on the road near my home at 6.20am.
GP's point is that everyone is paying the price for the choices that operators of motorbikes make. No one wants to listen to 'loudest allowable per federal regulations' riding past their family home after-hours. That price needs to be factored into the cost of operating a motorbike/truck/other loud transport near population centres.
That might be relevant if those Harley's were anywhere near the legal dB limit.
P.S. the hate I'm getting here for stating that I follow the law, to the letter, on noise regulations is insane. If you/anyone think a straight pipe Harley is close to legal check your facts.
"(fwiw my current vehicle is approximately the loudest allowable per federal regulations, because I enjoy the sound it makes, not safety per say.)"
These two statements don't balance.
I believe Dennis Leary wrote a song about this kind of thing.
When they go past and they pierce my ears, that bugs me... a lot !
It's so fun to point out new problems, but trying to prioritize everything is basically prioritizing nothing.
The effect constant noise polution has is very hard to grasp. I only noticed what it did to me when I moved to a new flat after a few years.
It felt like a 1000 pound weight had been lifted from me, and I realized it was about the noise after all. My sleep got much better, which had all kinds of positive effects on the rest of my life.
I can still remember vividly the first night I slept in the new flat in (what felt like) complete silence and peace for the first time in years.
If I could give advice to my past me, I would tell myself that the noise affects me much more than I thought.
> Try sleeping in an area where road noise occurs 24/7.
I admit I've never done that, but this seems like an unfairly extreme comparison. The same challenge can be posed for air pollution: try sleeping in an area where the air is bad enough to impact your sleep quality.
Well, millions of people live near major roads. Not everyone has the luxury of living in quiet suburbs and far from traffic.
> try sleeping in an area where the air is bad enough to impact your sleep quality.
Thats why i have an air purifier and windows closed for most of the week.
We both think the relatives are certifiable to not have moved away. :)
Moved for work - there was a surprisingly good opportunity that pulled us away from a more urban, but not major city, location. We did want to get out of urbanity anyway. Though I no longer work at the same place, hell will freeze before I move back to a city, or to nights that are no longer jet black.
Or a bus stop? Air brakes, audible announcements, and in some cities chirping every few seconds to alert the blind to its presence.
It is noooothing compared to the honking of any driver who feels like anything in the universe costing them more than one half of a second deserves an airhorn blast. Its nowhere near as annoying as the beep-beep-beep of trucks backing up. Its much fainter than the blasting ambulance and fire truck sirens necessary to pierce the bubble of car drivers attention. Its also much less than the idling engine noise of the delivery vans.
It was worth the substantial rent discount at the time I lived there, but pretty extreme as noise goes.
Also, road sounds remind me of the stresses of driving in traffic, whereas the train rides I've taken in my life have been a lot more peaceful.
The railway was far, far nicer. About ¾ of trains were electric, and just make a "whoosh" noise on the well-maintained welded track. The diesel trains were louder accelerating, but the noise wasn't participating disturbing.
My friend on the road side of the building couldn't open her window because of the traffic fumes, and even though the building was new and had good sound insulation, my side was nicer.
EVs don't appreciably reduce CO2 in the atmosphere, you need clean electricity generation for that. I'd hesitantly agree that they're going to be a part of a long term solution.
[1] https://cleantechnica.com/2016/06/05/will-electric-cars-make...
EVs do emit less CO2 than conventional vehicles, even in US states like West Virginia who power their grids mostly non-renewably: https://cleantechnica.com/2018/02/19/electric-car-well-to-wh...
Zero tailpipe CO2 emissions are just one advantage of EVs. They also emit zero particulates, zero ozone, and negligible engine noise.
EVs get cleaner as grid power gets cleaner. By contrast, tightening emissions standards only affects brand-new conventional vehicles, and these only get dirtier as they age.
This topic has been discussed on HN before; here's an insightful article and thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15106398
The linked article doesn't actually say what an EV in West Virginia pollutes (just flat out states that it's less than a conventional car), but the national average quoted is a bit less than half of a conventional car. The OP -- as people often do -- pretended it's zero. It's not. If you want zero emissions: walk. Or ride a bike, which is a rounding error off of zero. I hope you're just as quick to post your article when people make that mistake.
The number gets lower as grids get cleaner, yes, if they get cleaner. But we're at best struggling to clean up our grids, and moving transportation to electricity is going to roughly double the demand; at least if we pretend we don't have to simultaneously change the way we "consume" mobility.
Particulates from tires still happen for EV's and are a large concern in PM2.5 amounts.
While I don’t think it’s the next public health crisis, it’s certainly a crisis for me. And no, there’s nothing I can do about it. Good luck getting a city official to take up that battle. I’ve been told that maybe I’m just more sensitive to noise than others, and that their sensors can’t pick up noises over wind.
Isn't that illegal?
The problem is that a flag is, well, a flag. It’s treated as if they’d planted a tree and I’m upset but the wind rustling the leaves.
I’ve looked for anything analogous where wind acts upon an object to make loud noises, and I haven’t had luck.
Loud cars and motorcycles seem to be everywhere.
One guy doing it might not be that meaningful but, that’s true of just about everything.
I'll say this. In numerous cases, loud motorcyclists do it for their SAFETY. Most motorists don't pay attention to a small vehicle, especially if it were quiet. Most motorists are listening to music or something else, so the road doesn't have their utmost attention. The LOUDness of their motorcycle jolts the unattended motorists that a tiny vehicle is nearby.
As for the excessively loud, etc, that's above my understanding.
Finally, your biggest defense against loud motorists (in your home) is double drywalled and good insulation in your home. It will become a lot quieter and you'll have energy efficiencies by doing so.
I love it when someone who deliberately has a loud motorbike insists it has to be loud for safety reasons. I have met a few people who have claimed this. It always appears to be the only thing they do for safety reasons, the rest of their lives being a messy blur of insanely risky life decisions.
They don't wear chaps. Nor helmets. Nor anything else for safety. But let's reduce the argument only to your perception of this issue. /s Come on. Let's be more rational than this.
Yes, motorcyclists are risky. Yes they do numerous risky things. But everything we (a more general claim) do is on a gradient. It's on a sliding scale. Let's stop reducing this issue to 'loud noises don't help much. Nor has anyone, that I met claimed this. They are reckless people'.
You might never have 'bought' the argument but direction of the pipe doesn't take away from the fact that MOST people DO hear them as they begin to pass you. Except when they zip through going illegal mph. That's something that...baffles me. Why zip through WITH loud mufflers. They don't seem to be too bright but...fate comes for those cyclists fairly quickly.
If you want to become an organ donor, then go ahead. But you can't make everyone else deal with the externalities of your choice.
Loud pipes do help. Your minimizing of it doesn't negate that truth.
As for self-driving etc, ummm that's a bit off tangent. This is a discussion about noise pollution with an emphasis on motorcycle and the rationale to it.
I finally broke down and got the Sony WH1000MX3 headphones, which apparently have the "best" active noise cancellation. They do help, but they aren't perfect. They're also super expensive, which makes them impractical for a lot of people.
The entire problem could be solved with EVs or enforcing noise ordinances, but I feel like it just takes one person to ruin the whole thing.
I live on a semi-busy street in a big east coast city. It's almost amazing how many people honk and how often out of what looks mostly like frustration or spite. At least once a month someone honks for thirty straight seconds, always because they are mad about traffic that nobody can change.
You mean Boston?
You really want that average American, with less than $400 in savings, to think twice about honking and potentially saving someone's life by warning them of danger? It's not even about actually saving $5, it's about the length of time it takes to think about it. Even if you decide not to save the $5 and go for it, honk! you may have delayed so long that someone is now dead that could have been saved.
> If you really need to honk, you'll happily pay $5 for the ability.
This is very definitely not true and an incredible danger to society. Please reconsider the unintended consequences of charging poor people to maintain other people's physical safety on the roads and sidewalks.
[1] And I think this is a wonderful example of why all dictatorships are bad, especially those run by people who think they know all the solutions already.
(I think the idea of tying the could level inside the car to outside is better, but that you are missing the point)
http://claycord.com/2018/12/06/group-looks-to-ban-gas-powere...
The trimmers and leaf blowers were the worst part of living in mountain view for me. My apartment had no AC (didn't really need it 99% of the time), so that meant open windows... and almost every day had a different neighbors lawn service blasting noise in the morning. Sometimes waking me up, almost always making it impossible to work from home.
Can confirm. It's quite rare to hear the horn here.
I haven't ever used the horn (having had a license for 10 years) except by accident.
I live near to a busy road junction and have often witnessed situations where the sirens make matters worse because some drivers panic to get out of the way when, really, the best thing they should do is just keep moving forwards.
That's how I feel about noise pollution inside the office.
Last place I worked at had one big room that was a couple hundred feet square, and they had the noise generators cranked up so high that you couldn't successfully have a conversation with someone unless they were within about five feet of you. When I'd walk outside, it was a physical relief from the onslaught of white noise.
https://mynoise.net is great for this. There are loads of sound generators for different environments, each of which has sliders for each frequency. I sometimes use it when I have trouble falling asleep (I pin the site to my homepage on Android Chrome).
There is a curfew for flights at night but that only covers departures. Airplanes can still land at any hour.
It's a slow torture. I can't wait to leave San Diego.
Now I haven't opened the windows in years, especially not at night (else its impossible to sleep), the outdoor deck is unusable except for days where planes don't actually fly over because of wind direction, etc. Starting to plan selling the place partly because of it. Fortunately a lot of people swear until they're blue in the face that this isn't happening (even though its easy to find proof), so resell value isn't affected.
A lot of people say they are used to the sound and don't notice it. That's just not true though. I've sat outside at a bar and had a conversation interrupted because a plane flew overhead.
https://mv-voice.com/news/2018/06/01/nasa-picks-partner-for-...
Except in urban environments the sirens are 24/7, reverberate for blocks, and are extremely hard to localize until the vehicle is right next to you and blaring at 120dB.
It's like someone constantly yelling "hey, there's an emergency somewhere!"
Not even close. There are a lot of people who cannot afford EVs. There are a bunch of people who cannot afford a new car at any price. Most of the people you see on the road driving 20-year-old cars are not doing it by choice.
There are also a lot of people who could afford an EV but do not have a place to charge one, because they live in an apartment complex without chargers or need to use street parking. No, charging your car at work is not a good solution because there would not be enough chargers if everyone had to drive EVs.
The burden of banning internal-combustion vehicles would disproportionately fall upon renters and the poor, who are also the people most affected by noise pollution.
http://brusselstimes.com/business/technology/15050/electric-...
Above about 30-35 mph, EV's aren't much quieter than ICE cars, the contribution from road/tire noise starts to dominate for both types of autos above those speeds.
These increase costs which should be paid for by the people making the noise - vehicle drivers - but for some reason making those people and companies pay for their noise is politically unpopular.
You'd get a lot more mileage targeting heavy trucks, and older and/or modified vehicles.
EVs are great if you have the money for one but I am not putting my hand in my pocket when I have like a house to pay off first.
> ‘If you could eliminate all motor-vehicle noise or all motor-vehicle air pollution—but not both—which would you choose?’ As a rule, the majority chose noise.”
It can be hard to breathe in large cities in India and China.
I think the big thing is people don't know how to put earplugs in properly, the entire plug should be in your ear canal. To do it, you need to pull up from the top of your ear when inserting to fully seat it.
Put an earplug in your ear that seals the ear canal, then press firmly on the outside of your ear canal (on the side of your head, in front of the tragus). Feel that pressure. Now imagine doing that for 8 hours a night.
I have had to sleep with ear plugs because of noise from neighbors. Two results: waking up with painful ear canals during the night, and semi-permanently enlarged ear canals, requiring the use of larger ear plugs to seal, which causes more pain.
If you can comfortably sleep with ear plugs with no adverse effects, you are lucky.
Maybe one day we progress as a society to the point where one's right to quiet isn't dwarfed by others' right to make noise. Not gonna hold my breath though..
What almost works for me is using two differently sized earplugs and putting the smaller one in the pillow-side ear, because the pillow pushing on the ear canal causes it to seal despite the smaller plug. But when I roll onto my other side several times a night, I'd have to wake up and swap ear plugs. It's not feasible. :(