{"id":144503,"date":"2019-05-13T09:00:01","date_gmt":"2019-05-13T13:00:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/?p=144503"},"modified":"2021-09-13T12:20:09","modified_gmt":"2021-09-13T16:20:09","slug":"when-sound-becomes-noise","status":"publish","type":"bu-article","link":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/news\/articles\/2019\/when-sound-becomes-noise\/","title":{"rendered":"When Sound Becomes Noise"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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May 13, 2019<\/div>\n\t\t\n\t\t\t\t
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\"Sound\u201cAs sound gets louder, we begin to see the impacts go from annoyance to very serious health impacts,\u201d says\u00a0Erica Walker, postdoctoral associate in the Department of Environmental Health and creator of the new\u00a0Community Noise Lab<\/a>. At only 65 decibels\u2014about as loud as a car going by for someone standing on the side of the road\u2014research has shown that people begin experiencing increased risk of hypertension and heart attack.<\/p>\n

But not all sound is equal, Walker says. Someone\u2019s favorite music could be playing at 120 decibels, and, for that person, the sound is enjoyable. If their neighbor hates hearing that same music\u2014even if only at 65 decibels\u2014it is noise, and may have more of an impact on the neighbor\u2019s health than on the health of the person playing the music, Walker says.<\/p>\n

Because the difference between sound and noise is subjective, the Community Noise Lab is working directly with communities affected by noise pollution in the Boston area: the Fenway, Mission Hill, East Boston, and the nearby town of Andover. Together, they are measuring and taking on not only the volume of sound, but also the irritation of noise.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the Fenway, if you ask them what\u2019s really bothering them, they\u2019re not going to tell you it\u2019s road traffic noise or aircraft noise\u2014those aren\u2019t even in the top three,\u201d Walker says. \u201cThey\u2019re telling me, \u2018We\u2019re bothered by outdoor concerts at Fenway Park.\u2019 If I\u2019m an epidemiologist and I\u2019m using Fenway as a sample and I\u2019m looking at the impact of aircraft noise on cardiovascular health, that may not be the noise that\u2019s driving the heath impact. I would be misclassifying the experience.\u201d<\/p>\n

Andover connected with her for help trying to get a sound wall to muffle the nose-to-bumper commuter traffic on Interstate 93, and East Boston residents are concerned about the roar of planes taking off and landing at Logan Airport. Fast-growing Mission Hill, meanwhile, faces construction noise and new buildings\u2019 loud HVAC systems, as well as the ambulance sirens, medevac helicopters, and traffic to the Longwood Medical Area\u2019s hospitals\u2014and <\/em>above-ground Orange Line and Green Line trains<\/p>\n

With a two-year, $410,000 grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Community Noise Lab is working with members of the four communities\u2014and researchers and students across Boston University\u2014to create a real-time sound-monitoring network of eight rotating sound stations, and developing version 2.0 of the Community Noise Lab\u2019s smartphone app, NoiseScore, which allows residents to both objectively and subjectively describe their environmental soundscape and their own responses in real time. Walker is also leading a series of community-engagement activities, including \u201csound walks\u201d and a podcast, and conducting a laboratory-based experiment examining the acute neurological underpinnings of noise exposure.<\/p>\n

All of the Community Noise Lab\u2019s work will be documented on the Lab\u2019s\u00a0website<\/a>, where each of the four communities has its own page. Meanwhile, the site\u2019s\u00a0community library<\/a> offers free access to fact sheets, reports, and data\u2014for researchers and community members alike.<\/p>\n

Walker describes the Lab\u2019s approach as \u201cride-sharing.\u201d While gathering data from these four communities, \u201cI\u2019m sharing the ride with others who have their own noise-related journeys and destinations,\u201d she says. \u201cThat\u2019s my definition of public health.\u201d<\/p>\n

The response has been enthusiastic. \u201cPeople are really excited\u2014everybody wants the sound-monitoring equipment in their house!\u201d says Mary Ann Nelson, executive director of Mission Hill Health Movement. Nelson says the collaboration is making her neighborhood think about solutions to forms of noise pollution that they had thought were inescapable.<\/p>\n

Long-time residents of Mission Hill automatically pause conversations for an ambulance siren or house-rattling train, Nelson says, often without even realizing it. \u201cNo one was thinking that there was anything to do about the hospitals and the Orange and Green Lines.\u201d Now, the community is thinking about what kinds of solutions the Community Noise Lab\u2019s research could lead to, like regulations for new buildings to better block sound, or the hospitals helping offset the costs of new windows for residents.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think this is going to make a big difference,\u201d Nelson says.<\/p>\n

\u2014Michelle Samuels<\/em><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Community Noise Lab creator Erica Walker works with local communities to identify, measure, and seek solutions to noise pollution and its health effects.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10989,"featured_media":144645,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"bu_prepress_billboard":"","_bu_prepress_primary_term":"","_bu_prepress_primary_term_manual":""},"tags":[2408,2633,2231,2419],"bu-publication":[3516],"sphnews-article-category":[3519,3529,3531,3540,3541],"sphnews-topic":[],"bu_edition":[],"media_type":[],"profile_tax":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article\/144503"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/bu-article"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10989"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=144503"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article\/144503\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":201033,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article\/144503\/revisions\/201033"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/144645"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=144503"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=144503"},{"taxonomy":"bu-publication","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-publication?post=144503"},{"taxonomy":"sphnews-article-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/sphnews-article-category?post=144503"},{"taxonomy":"sphnews-topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/sphnews-topic?post=144503"},{"taxonomy":"bu_edition","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu_edition?post=144503"},{"taxonomy":"media_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media_type?post=144503"},{"taxonomy":"profile_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/profile_tax?post=144503"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}