Photo credit: Oscar Ovalle by Arline L. Bronzaft, Ph.D., Board of Directors, GrowNYC, Co-founder, The Quiet Coalition, and Honorary Chair, Quiet American Skies Linda Briskin lets her readers know that she disliked noise from the time she was a child. Apparently, the sounds of anger from her family led her to hide under her bed
Photo credit: Frédéric SALEIN licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0 by Daniel Fink, MD, Chair, The Quiet Coalition I recently wrote about a nighttime noise measurement just under 30 A-weighted decibels (dBA)* in the Huab Reserve in Namibia, but I can now report an even quieter nighttime noise measurement: Only 28.3 dBA average sound pressure level, on
Photo credit: Darius Krause from Pexels by Daniel Fink, MD, Chair, The Quiet Coalition The National Park Service noise maps show that without anthropogenic noise, nature is quiet. I have measured nighttime noise levels just above or just below 30 dBA in remote parts of Wales, the French Alps, and Sri Lanka. I was in
by Arline L. Bronzaft, Ph.D., Board of Directors, GrowNYC, Co-founder, The Quiet Coalition, and Honorary Chair, Quiet American Skies Yes, indeed, humans can learn from other species. Sometimes, we forget this, but Manasee Wagh in her article “Why Owls Are a ‘Spirit Animal’ for Engineers Building Quieter Aircraft” reminds us that when it comes to
Photo credit: Dr. Daniel Fink by Daniel Fink, MD, Chair, The Quiet Coalition I am an inveterate DIYer, maintaining two houses and assisting in keeping two others in good repair, so I have a lot of tools and am always looking for better ones. My father taught me that any job is easier to do
Photo credit: Jo Kassis from Pexels by Daniel Fink, MD, Chair, The Quiet Coalition This report from Discover discusses how plants can help absorb, diffuse, or block noise, especially road traffic noise. I didn’t know that noise actually makes leaves tremble, transforming sound energy into mechanical energy, and thereby dissipating it. To reall make a
Photo credit: Michelle Cipriano licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0 by Daniel Fink, MD, Chair, The Quiet Coalition The National Park Service noise maps show that without anthropogenic sounds--that is, human influenced sounds--nature is quiet. The top map shows existing noise conditions in the U.S., with the brighter yellow colors in cities being 53 A-weighted decibels* (dBA)
Photo credit: Thomas Good licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0 by Arline L. Bronzaft, Ph.D., Board of Directors, GrowNYC, and Co-founder, The Quiet Coalition Shant Shahrigian’s article on New York City mayoral candidate Scott Stringer's recent press conference to discuss city noise was titled “Quiet! NYC mayoral hopeful Scott Stringer promises to crack down on annoying noise.”
Photo credit: Vicky Deshmukh from Pexels by Arline L. Bronzaft, Ph.D., Board of Directors, GrowNYC, and Co-founder, The Quiet Coalition We all know that city dwellers have changed their routines during the pandemic. According to Matthew Rozsa, so have urban pigeons. With more people staying home and fewer cars on the road, cities are less
We can dream of a peaceful and quiet new year
