Michael Moynihan: Fine-tuning the sounds of our city to cut out the noise that annoys

Noise is regarded as the second biggest environmental factor causing health problems, according to a World Health Organization report

Accommodating the inconvenience of other people’s needs — the inconvenience of others’ presence — is one of the basic building blocks of society.

I see that Dublin now has a citizens’ assembly.

No, no. Fair is fair. The large conurbation to the east isn’t overburdened with advantages, so it’s only right that it should be provided with — I see from my notes — a body of 80 members chaired by the former Dublin football manager Jim Gavin, which has been asked to consider and report to the Oireachtas on new local government structures for Dublin. (Isn’t there a Dáil for that? — a reader. Hush!)

Anyway, I note that well-known writer Roddy Doyle spoke to this rump parliament about his native Dublin, telling them that the city, to him, was about words. “Dublin is not a place,” he said. “Dublin is a sound. Dublin is the sound of people talking.”

Roddy is correct. For many of us, Dublin is indeed a sound, usually people making a sound like ‘doyehknowhwarrImeaan’ out through their nostrils. This sound is generally taken as an instance of the famous Dublin wit, though to most of us it sounds like noise.

And noise is the matter under discussion today, though not before pointing out that giving any part of the country an assembly of people to recommend changes to the way that part of the country is governed should be filed under ‘precedents, dangerous’.

The reason I bring up noise is that until I looked into this matter I didn’t realise, for instance, that noise is regarded as the second biggest environmental factor causing health problems (air pollution tops the charts).

This is according to a World Health Organization report in 2018, and things haven’t quietened down since with the exception of the silence brought on temporarily by lockdown: a UN report published as recently as February declared urban noise pollution one of the world’s “top emerging environmental threats”.

Go back three years and a study carried out in Paris by the city’s regional health agency and Bruitparif found that noise was cutting the life expectancy of Parisians by almost 11 months. Bruitparif, by the way, is a non-profit environmental organisation responsible for monitoring the environmental noise in Paris. 

Its director said at the time of that 2019 report that: “For a long time, noise was seen more as a quality-of-life issue, but not a health risk. But the reality is that there are massive health consequences, and more and more research is proving this.”

On the one hand, noise is something you have to expect in a city. By definition, a small zone where thousands of people live is going to be noisier than one where thousands of people don’t dwell. And accommodating the inconvenience of other people’s needs — the inconvenience of others’ presence — is one of the basic building blocks of society. Compromise between citizens is what makes a society in the first place.

Yet even if you don’t have hypersensitive ears, noise can be so intrusive and unsettling that it’s no surprise to hear of the health implications. If a drill is being used in earshot all day because of building work nearby, then you’ll acknowledge that; likewise if your sleep is disturbed by noise at night.

The specific health implications?

Because of the presence of active, energetic organisations such as Bruitparif there appears to be a lot of information and statistics coming out of France. 

For instance, I saw a Bloomberg report stating that research by France’s National Noise Council (CNB) and the French Environment and Energy Management Agency (ADEME) estimated the loss of productivity caused by disturbed sleep as costing approximately €147bn each year, with 25 million French residents saying noise had an impacted on their lives — in fact, over 430,000 French people said they were taking tranquilisers to cope with it.

No wonder Bruitparif pointed out that a single modified scooter travelling through Paris at night can wake 10,000 people. To which I only had one response: the buck riding that modified scooter has plenty of relations in Cork. 

Take the ape who used to test his car’s sound system as he did doughnuts around the corner from my house. In my mind’s eye, he wouldn’t be a Parisian sophisticate to judge by his taste in music, but you never know.

Here is where the notion of compromise between citizens begins to break down, and the notion of violent reprisal takes hold as you regard the bedroom ceiling at 3am.

The answer?

Unfortunately, there was a lot of grim chuckling done while researching this piece, because the work of proactive local authorities in various jurisdictions soon began to read to me like science fiction.

To take one example, for years the city of Edmonton in Canada has had several noise radar boxes on electricity poles in the city to monitor the levels of noise. Reports on its efficiency vary — the fines imposed by noise detection don’t cover the cost of running the monitors, for instance, but the mere fact that fines have been imposed is remarkable in itself.

Other cities in north America have taken on the issue of noise by appointing a ‘night mayor’ — someone with responsibility for issues which arise at night in a city, like noise. Laws and regulations have also been introduced which include, for instance, bans on leaf blowers, or on construction being only allowed at certain hours.

Yes, yes, I know. Don’t all laugh at once at that last provision. Instead, wring some gallows humour from the realisation that no matter how sophisticated the city’s approach to noise pollution, there’ll still be builders in that city who’ll insist on firing up an angle grinder at half six in the morning.

And that brings us to the crux of the issue — in Cork, and everywhere else. The bottom line with noise in the city is that it’s the ultimate arbiter of your willingness to take responsibility for your own actions. 

Whether it’s on the Boulevard Haussmann or the Grand Parade, if you have regard for your fellow inhabitants of the city then you adjust your behaviour accordingly. And if you don’t have regard for them, that quickly becomes apparent as well.

The fact that Paris is now relying on noise radar monitors suggests the days of depending on citizens to behave reasonably may be gone: Paris will start issuing fines for noise pollution early next year.

Should Cork be looking to emulate the Parisians? Well, there isn’t any issue with enormous electrical devices being installed on Leeside anyway.

Eoin English of this parish wrote earlier this week about the deployment of mobile broadband signal booster masts, which are popping up around Cork: “This system, with zero public consultation and prohibitive appeals fees, one which seems to be balanced in favour of telecoms companies, has prompted renewed calls from members of Cork City Council for a review of the national legislation and licensing process to rebalance the system back towards local communities.”

If the local authority can facilitate private companies in their drive for profits, then surely it could follow the lead given by other cities in tackling the noise issue. And not by fobbing us off with a citizens’ assembly, by the way, where we’d have to jam our fingers in our ears to shut out . . . the noise.