Industry Noise

The definition of noise as “unwanted sound” is purposely devoid of technical language owing to the wide spectrum of possible effects upon humans that are both physiological and psychological. The former is largely objective and the latter subjective. While there are a considerable number of published efforts to establish criteria on hearing‐damage risk, such “numbers” are widely debated upon the basis of lack of valid supporting data. In the area of annoyance, efforts to establish criteria are on even more untenable grounds. Attempts to equate degrees of annoyance are most difficult and highly complex. An effort to attach numbers to annoyance is faced not only with emotional and sociological factors but also with the fact that there are wide differences in human susceptibility and adaptability to noise. This paper discusses the major efforts that have been made to evaluate annoyance from industrial noise, zoning laws with performance standards, the rôle of transportation noise in such standards, and the views of the author on the usefulness of such data.