How to monitor environmental noise

One of the regular top hits on my blog is the post I did about how to report a noise complaint in Ann Arbor. Recently, the local college has been doing a little bit of construction around their playing field, and some of the neighbors have complained about the sound.

If you were going to spend too much money to monitor noise, you'd put together some kind of infrastructure with data loggers at various points around the area, all of which sent their readings (and perhaps audio capture) back to a central system for analysis and reporting and alerting. Here's some of what I was able to find out about that.

From Make Magazine: "Volumen", a giant graphic equalizer built by Argentinian artist, Sergio Avello relays the ambient urban noise levels around the Redgaleria in Buenos Aires. Pretty intense way of visualizing the constant buzz of the city, plus nice shots of the internal circuits.

The Noise Pollution Clearinghouse has a vast array of information and experts about noise pollution. Their sponsors include Quest Technologies, makers of a bunch of noise level monitoring and analysis tools.

In the mining industry, a company called Vipac markets an environmental noise monitor with built in GSM phone (so you can call in and listen), an MP3 recorder which clicks in when sound exceeds a threshold, a solar cell for off-grid use and reporting of data back to a central web server for analysis. No price listed.

Noisemeters.com has a data logging, noise metering sign with clear graphics showing when sound levels have been exceeded on a big indoor sign, and a data logger which collects information about noise levels that can be downloaded from a PC (not real time). w/software, this runs about $1200. They also have a Noise Pole outdoor monitor mounted permanently high out of the way unobtrusively with similar logging (call for pricing) and a portable logging noise monitor which runs about $9000.

CSN sells a Virco LIBLITE designed for indoor cafeteria use with a red-yellow-green stoplight style display, designed either to get kids in a cafeteria to scream at the top of their lungs or to quiet them down (not clear what the actual results would be).

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I didn't find some simple homebrew system, but the "graphic equalizer" direction seems like it might be reasonable - how hard could it be to turn an iPhone into a portable noise meter of some kind?

At the low end these are called "sound level meters", here's a review of a $50 device, with no remote reading capability.

A London noise map showing the quiet and noisy parts of town.

Comments

[Bob Kuehne]

just read about a very loud city, cairo:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/14/world/middleeast/14cairo.html?em&ex=1208318400&en=0799aacfa62490bd&ei=5070