New York City is a really noisy place.
Over a third of all 311 calls in the first quarter of this year were noise-related, according to a report released Tuesday by New York City Councilmember Keith Powers, who represents the extra loud neighborhoods of Midtown and its surrounding areas. The city’s legislative body was scheduled to introduce seven bills aimed at reducing noise pollution on Wednesday, including enforcement actions against the most clamorous violators. But the meeting was postponed on Tuesday, and City Council spokesperson Isaac Andino said it will likely be rescheduled for next month.
The legislative package seeks to amend the standards for what is unreasonable noise for commercial establishments. The new definition pertains to noise emanating from both interior and exterior spaces such as music from bars. The regulations would also extend to construction sites, which could be subject to inspections by the city’s Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), upon the request of any resident within a half-mile radius of an active work zone.
The proposed laws go beyond expanding the definition of when sound becomes a nuisance. For vehicular traffic, monitoring and enforcement actions could look a lot like the city’s existing speed camera program.
One of the strategies to quiet the city is introducing so-called “noise cameras” along streets. In February 2022, the DEP announced a pilot program that installed such devices with sound meters 15 feet above roadways. These cameras activate when they detect a sound of 85 A-weighted decibels (dB(A)) or more from about 50 feet away.
At that distance, without factoring in car modifications such as loud mufflers and exhaust pipes or the bass-pumping subwoofers, the threshold would ticket the average heavy-duty diesel tractor trailer traveling at 40 mph, which has a level at just about 85 dB(A).
“Noise is a harmful health hazard,” said noise expert Arline Bronzaft, professor emerita of CUNY who was also…
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