City of Noises

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 770, 17 September 1929, Page 8

City of Noises

Future Traffic Sound Problems

STREET noises and vibration liave been blamed by overseas medical experts for nervous disorders and mental lassitude among people in large cities. How far these sounds affect the nerves and minds in Auckland it is difficult to determine, but the volume of street noises in this city is swelling daily, and the erection of high business blocks in Queen Street is intensifying rather than relieving the problem.

One Writer who recently became agitated because of the alarming influence of street noises, suggested the introduction of a uniform motor-car horn “with a low musical note” as a counterbalancing factor in this accumulated noise. It is doubtful, however, whether a low musical note would be sufficient to leave a safety margin for Auckland’s jay-walkers when the traffic is thickest in Queen Street. Even the vicious buzzers of the celebrated “Klaxon” type, so enthusiastically condemned in the City by-laws, frequently fail to give more than an eccentric passage between tramcars, street centre-poles and flying pedestrians.

That, perhaps, is an exaggerated glimpse of Queen Street at 5 o’clock in the afternoon: hut it cannot be denied that the traffic noise in the City’s main thoroughfare has reached a pitch and volume at which authoritative action might soon be considered necessary. CAR TO 11 PEOPLE If every City ordinance were observed with scrupulous exactitude, of course—granting that this were possible—Auckland wQuld quickly become a City of delightful silence. But when it is remembered that approximately 16 new motor-cars are placed on the road daily throughout the province, and that one person in every 11 in the City owns a car already, it is readily realised that the tendency is for noise to increase rather than to diminish. And when a reminder is given that new tramcars must shortly he brought into use to meet the increasing demand for'%transport, the prospect of a silent city fades into the distance like a beautiful mirage. Few people could, with any conscience, feel happy that by-law No. 343 is rigidly observed by motorists:

No driver of a motor vehicle shall cause or permit the machinery of such vehicle to be worked in such a manner as to cause undue nbise, or cause or permit a cut-out to be used on the exhaust pipe of such machinery, or use any “Klaxon” siren or shrill whistle. . \ .

It is necessary, however, to possess a “horn, whistle, bell or other

instrument,” attached to the vehicle, and the rest is merely securing a happy medium in blowing or ringing it. The difficulty of striking this middle course impressed itself strongly upon one Auckland motorist some time ago when, after being fined for not blowing his car horn at an intersection, he was prosecuted for sounding it with sufficient severity as to become a nuisance! Other silence-seeking by-laws are shattered at most inconvenient moments. The bottle-collector is breaking the law when he rents the morning air with his cries, for it is illegal “to sing or play any musical instrument, preach, read, lecture or cry wares ” Moreover, the street newspaper-sellers are no freer from the law than are the auctioneers’ blatant bellringers, for a general provision in the City statute demands that* “no person shall wantonly or maliciously disturb any inhabitant by improperly starting or setting in motion any fire alarm, ringing any doorbell, knocking at any door, blowing any trumpet or horn, beating any drum or gong, using any other noisy instrument or ringing any bell in any public place, or in any doorway abutting thereon.” COMMISSION INVESTIGATING

The by-laws quoted are of long standing, but the rapid development of mechanical music has occasioned the introduction of another ordinance which brings shop-door mechanical music within the realms of public nuisance in certain circumstances. When all these various sounds are concentrated into the busiest portion of Queen Street—trams flying by, motor-cars stopping and starting, gramophones playing at frequent intervals, an occasional hydraulic rivetter rattling upon a new construction job, and the generally attendant noises of this big movement —Auckland indeed becomes a noisy city. In London a commission comprising some of the greatest authorities upon transport, architecture and civic affairs, has been appointed to investigate the general problem of street traffic noises. Their investigations will extend over many months, and their conclusions are expected to indicate the direction in which future town builders must go in order to attain the ideal of a reasonably quiet city. L.J.C.