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Sounding the alarm: How noise hurts the heart (2021)

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171–180 of 531 posts

Re: Sounding the alarm: How noise hurts the heart (2021)

#171
post #61

Why do we still have the beep, beep, beep when trucks back up? We have backup cameras now. Everyone within half a mile is continually alerted that there's a truck backing up or a piece of construction equipment moving.

There is a version that does kssssh kssssh kssssh instead. It’s a lot less obnoxious but not standard yet so only a few trucks have it. It’s much nicer.

Re: Sounding the alarm: How noise hurts the heart (2021)

#172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People are so unbelievably disrespectful with noise in the US. Peaceful hike? Here's Katy Perry crackling out of my iPhone at full blast! Luxury apartment at $4k a month? No insulation between units, and the guy above you comes home at 2am and never takes his shoes off. Small country street? Here comes Chad with his straight-piped civic with the muffler removed!

I find by far the biggest disruption in US suburbs is lawn equipment. Suburbs are louder than cities imo because there is always a leaf blower, lawn mower, and weedwacker going at all times during the day within 100 yards of you. Often for hours. Moving from Palo Alto to SF things got way quieter.

Nevermind giant pickup trucks rumbling down the streets.

Re: Sounding the alarm: How noise hurts the heart (2021)

#174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find by far the biggest disruption in US suburbs is lawn equipment. Suburbs are louder than cities imo because there is always a leaf blower, lawn mower, and weedwacker going at all times during the day within 100 yards of you. Often for hours. Moving from Palo Alto to SF things got way quieter.

I fucking loathe leaf blowers. I can tell what day of the week it is by which neighbor is going for an hour or two straight with the leaf blower. Get a damn rake!

Ah, leaf blowers. The planet is warming and still, the little hooman burns oil to move leafs forward, waking up the entire neighborhood. Those things should be banned worldly.

Re: Sounding the alarm: How noise hurts the heart (2021)

#175

This is one of the things I struggle with the most in life. I feel like most people don't seem to care about noise pollution and zero care is put into designing living spaces or cities to minimize it. I've moved into apartments and nearly cried because I realized that there was some noise pollution that wasn't apparent when I visited it (e.g. a water boiler that ran constantly at night, road noise during the day, etc…

I don't know if it helps you, but as someone who's very annoyed by road noise, one thing I've found makes a huge difference is replacing the window stripping with as much and as thick foam as you can fit. Most apartments are built with thin stripping in the first place and routine maintenance almost never replaces it. The first time I did it, my apartment bedroom at the time went from the loudest I've ever had to the quietest I've ever had.

Re: Sounding the alarm: How noise hurts the heart (2021)

#176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Suburbs are louder than cities imo because there is always a leaf blower, lawn mower, and weedwacker going at all times during the day within 100 yards of you. That's hugely hyperbolic. But in the city there really are constant sirens, car horns, diesel trucks, construction noises, roadway noise etc... The most comprehensive study done on this (admittedly a long time ago in 1970) shows a clear correlation between po…

Cities aren't loud, cars (and trucks) are loud https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CTV-wwszGw8 Video discusses this thoroughly. There ARE quiet cities amazingly enough. And suburbs are a HUGE source of the noise IN the cities they surround because it's the car traffic from suburbs into the cities that makes much of the noise. Cities ARE loud, but they don't HAVE to be.

And electric vehicles are a lot less so.

Everytime I get passed by an e-bike my brain has a little pleasure seizure from not having to suffer the expected rawkus.

Re: Sounding the alarm: How noise hurts the heart (2021)

#177
post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I fucking loathe leaf blowers. I can tell what day of the week it is by which neighbor is going for an hour or two straight with the leaf blower. Get a damn rake!

Ah, leaf blowers. The planet is warming and still, the little hooman burns oil to move leafs forward, waking up the entire neighborhood. Those things should be banned worldly.

I can't find it, but I remember the story of an individual who lead a crusade against leaf blowers and was somewhat successful.

Re: Sounding the alarm: How noise hurts the heart (2021)

#178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find by far the biggest disruption in US suburbs is lawn equipment. Suburbs are louder than cities imo because there is always a leaf blower, lawn mower, and weedwacker going at all times during the day within 100 yards of you. Often for hours. Moving from Palo Alto to SF things got way quieter.

>Suburbs are louder than cities imo because there is always a leaf blower, lawn mower, and weedwacker going at all times during the day within 100 yards of you. That's hugely hyperbolic. But in the city there really are constant sirens, car horns, diesel trucks, construction noises, roadway noise etc... The most comprehensive study done on this (admittedly a long time ago in 1970) shows a clear correlation between po…

Cities aren't inherently louder than countryside. Car traffic is noisy, but the volume is proportional to the speed. Cars going 30 km/h aren't THAT noisy. You don't hear them through the windows. Cars going 90 km/h are VERY noisy and at that point it doesn't matter if they are electric or not - you mostly hear the tires and the aerodynamics.

Using car horns at cities is forbidden anyway, unless there's a crash or a dangerous situation you shouldn't hear them. I can't remember the last time I've heard a car horn in my city.

I've lived in countryside and in several places in 2 different big cities in Poland, and except for one time I lived near a big 4-lane road in the middle of the city (which is a disgrace of communist urban planning BTW) - cities were quieter than the countryside.

Cars are going faster in the countryside and dogs are constantly barking at night at anything that moves.

BTW another factor is windows quality. It significantly changes how quiet your home is.

Re: Sounding the alarm: How noise hurts the heart (2021)

#179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People are so unbelievably disrespectful with noise in the US. Peaceful hike? Here's Katy Perry crackling out of my iPhone at full blast! Luxury apartment at $4k a month? No insulation between units, and the guy above you comes home at 2am and never takes his shoes off. Small country street? Here comes Chad with his straight-piped civic with the muffler removed!

I find by far the biggest disruption in US suburbs is lawn equipment. Suburbs are louder than cities imo because there is always a leaf blower, lawn mower, and weedwacker going at all times during the day within 100 yards of you. Often for hours. Moving from Palo Alto to SF things got way quieter.

Leaf blowing to the other side and then another leaf blower needed to blow it back.

Madness.

Re: Sounding the alarm: How noise hurts the heart (2021)

#180

This is why I left New York City. For some reason, being inside / covid lockdowns did something to my head and now I'm super sensitive to noise. Prior, I lived in Boston for six years generally in very loud (third to fifth floor) apartments with reasonable amounts of street / city noise. Oddly, for a time it actually calmed my ADHD and distracted me enough that I felt I could focus. Initially I was lucky and had a gr…

Where in Colorado? I previously lived in NYC, moved to Denver. Noise was much much better here during 2020, but vehicle noise has gotten awful this year. Well, that and all of the people who drive around without catalytic converters because they've been stolen...
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