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

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

#201

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!

Leaf blowers are the worst. Several cities in CA have banned them. I don't know why more haven't followed suit.

There's a myth that groundskeeping is more costly without them, but the city of LA reported that costs didn't significantly increase after banning them.[1]

[1] https://www.dailybreeze.com/2018/08/21/redondo-beach-bans-le...

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

#202
post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but neither do suburbs. You could mandate everyone drive electric vehicles with tires optimized for low road noise.

Tesla going 90 km/h is almost as noisy as regular car going 90 km/h. Engine noise only dominates at low speeds.

And what is the speed limit right outside your house/apartment?

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

#203

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…

round me its just leaf blowers for ~4 hours everyday a few months a year

Its really annoying for WFH

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

#204

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!

As someone who had to travel to the bay area for years I'll add: Caltrain honking its way through all suburbs, even at night.

Oh my word the caltrain! I had no idea before I moved here. I live miles away from the track now, and I can still hear it.

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

#205
post #153
post #43

Quoted post unavailable.

Perhaps if you and others who feel the same way would form your own communities around these common values, you could experience the lifestyle you prefer without it being forced on others. (Alternatively, you may enjoy living in Europe, most cities here you don't even need a car. I get along fine with a bicycle!)

In a lot of places it's strictly illegal to build car-free places. Minimum parking requirements, strict euclidean zoning, etc. The car-free or low-car places that do exist are hideously expensive due to high demand. If anything the car lifestyle is being forced on people.

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

#206

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…

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!

> guy above you comes home at 2am and never takes his shoes off

He shouldn't have to IMO. Building codes should require buildings to be sound proof between units. Yea, I know that's dreaming but I've lived in such units. I once lived in an apartment in LA. It was the first apartment in my life that had an in-unit washer and dryer. I asked the guy showing me the apartment "I'll bet I shouldn't run that after 10pm". He responded "These apartments were built as condos and they have double concrete walls between units so your neighbors won't hear you. Feel free to run them anytime day or night". And, the 18 months I was there I never heard a noise from any other unit.

Conversely, I lived in a fairly typical SF place. Older and not designed for sound proofing. It was so bad that I mostly stayed out of my bedroom because the just being in it the guy downstairs would complain. Basically all I ever did was walk in, climb in bed. When I woke up, get out of the room. I felt for the guy, it must have been like a drum but at the same time I shouldn't have not been able to live in my apartment (oh, and I didn't wear shoes).

I had a guest room. Every single guest (friends, not AirBnB) would get yelled at their first night just trying to change out of their clothing into their pajamas.

The funniest one was a girl moved in downstairs. One night at 3am I moved my bed about 4 inches. A single move not making a sound for more than 1-2 seconds. The next morning she came up to bitch me out of waking her up. I told her I didn't complain about hearing her masturbate every night. I just put on my headphones and checked in 20 minutes. She moved out the next day.

I feel like the law should have made the landlord make that apartment more sound proof.

In my current place there's an industrial air conditioner running on the building next door. It runs 24/7 even though no one has been in the building during COVID. With any window open it's around 60db which is fine maybe when you're awake but it sucks when you're drying to go to sleep. With the windows closed it basically sounds like someone is running a vacuum cleaner in the room next door, all night.

Further, some, the city, or some company, comes by at 4am and empties trash cans. The pick them up and bang them. It takes them ~10 minutes to get them all. Everyone in the building has complained and AFAICT both of these are illegal.

https://www.sfdph.org/dph/files/ehsdocs/ehsnoise/guidelinesn...

But so far it's been impossible to get anything enforced.

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

#207
This is obvious to those (like me) who get stressed out with excessive noise. Despite having born and brought up in India I could never get used to constant white noise. It stresses me out like crazy.

I realised the value of silence the first night in Netherlands. I could physically feel heart go down and mental peace. They take noise levels seriously and it shows!

Edit: Details.

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

#208
This is a good report that specify how to measure the link between noise and heart/health: https://www.rivm.nl/bibliotheek/rapporten/2018-0121.pdf

EU now require every large train, road and air traffic change to use this guide.

Short version: 1) Gather data from health records on the number of people that can be affected by noise by the change 2) Use this is the calculations for the new noise levels for the alternatives proposed 3) This calculations have to be made public, and you have to stay under certain noise levels

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

#209
post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tesla going 90 km/h is almost as noisy as regular car going 90 km/h. Engine noise only dominates at low speeds.

And what is the speed limit right outside your house/apartment?

On small roads between the blocks ("strefa zamieszkania") it's 20 km/h. Also pedestrians have right of way over cars on these roads everywhere, no matter the crossings. Usually these roads are made of bricks and have these "bumps" so you won't go much faster even if you wanted to. That's the closest road to me (like 50 meters from my flat).

On regular roads it's 50 km/h. There's one like 300 meters from my flat.

On a few big multilane roads it's 90 km/h or more but the closest such road is 700 meters from my flat, and it has these noise-cancelling panels around it.

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