Neglect is the theme of a shocking document—"Noise: Sound Without Value"—prepared by the Federal Council for Science and Technology and released in 1968. This report tells in detail how the administrative branch of the Federal government is aware of the growing seriousness of unregulated noise. It then documents how all that is lacking is a policy, authorization, budget, research facilities, and a coordinating noise abatement program.
Not only does society not regulate the most serious noises in the environment, it does not design that environment to provide a buffer between permanent noise sources and the public. Noise is seldom mentioned in the conferences of planners, and an expert committee of the World Health Organization has had to urge metropolitan planners to cooperate with environmental health personnel to create environments with reduced noise and vibration.
"There is is no evidence," states Canadian government noise researcher George Thiessen, "that traffic noise has had any appreciable influence on decisions made in the field of planning." Homes are built on top of busy highways, and even hospitals are not shielded from traffic noise. It was not until 1967 that the Federal government started even to consider potential noise radiation in routing the 2,500 miles of urban highway that are still to be built for the interstate highway system.
Our lives are excessively noisy because not only do city planners tend to ignore surface noise, they totally ignore noise from the sky. Though the airplane is the chief culprit, airport design and operation are important factors in the jet noise problem. Yet the airport operator is usually free of any restraints.
It is somewhat behind the times to plan for green belts as buffers from noisy factories, while leaving the residential areas the buffers are supposed to protect exposed to overhead noise from aviation.