It is not "natural" for machines to make noise, but without any incentive to do otherwise, industry assembles its machines—and buildings—to meet the more obviously rewarding goals of style (something that can be sold) and economy.
Poorly designed gears, imperfectly designed and installed bearings, improperly designed air flow used to cool rotating parts—these are some of the "unnatural" reasons mechanized products produce noise. To add acoustic insult to industrial tightfistedness, light-weight metal has been substituted for enclosures made of heavy cast iron. These light-weight covers are "excited" by the poorly balanced, poorly insulated motors of dishwashers and air compressors alike, and in turn vibrate and generate additional noise.
Without legal restraints, air conditioners provide thermal comfort at the cost of acoustic discomfort. Without regulation, our subways climb above 90 decibels, as noisy as heavy trucks at 20 feet and train whistles at 500 feet. Subway noise complaints are as much a part of American life as apple pie and Girl Scout cookies. And though Americans hear little about railroad noise these days, Canadian experts describe railroad trains as the noisiest form of surface transportation.
Acoustic anarchy is the only description for motor vehicle operation. In the United States there are neither national regulations nor national guidelines for what is patently a problem of interstate commerce. Only two states, New York and California, have adopted decibel limits, in both cases too high. A handful of North American cities have specified noise maxima, but these are either too high or of doubtful legality. Milwaukee, which is often cited for its excellent decibel law, had as a matter of record to rescind its ordinance in 1957, because its Municipal Court ruled that the use of decibel meters was unconstitutional. Toronto enacted a decibel law which held up in the courts, but because of a technicality, enforcement was restricted to one, and only one, sound-measuring instrument. Hampered by this restriction, Toronto police use the traditional guide of "unreasonable noise" as an enforcement basis.
Famous for enforcing its motor vehicle muffler and horn laws, Memphis does not have an ordinance concerning the use of the sound meter; however, the city court judges have accepted the police department's criteria of 90 decibels for automobiles and 100 decibels for trucks. The permitted noise levels are so high, judges need have no qualms the noisemakers would be unable to meet them easily.
The absence of effective standards allows 40 per cent of the trucks on New York's highways to generate excessive noise. More than 50 per cent of the trucks in the midtown New York City area were reported by an acoustician to have noisy engines and poor mufflers.
Not only does society permit inadequate muffling of motor vehicles, it totally ignores the other sources of automotive noise. General Motors publishes a silencing manual for the guidance of purchasers of its trucks and motors. The manual notes that truck operators need concern themselves only with mufflers, since laws do not cover engine noise and other vehicular noise sources.
One of the noise sources ignored by regulations is the auto horn. There are no maximum standards for horn emissions. In France, automobiles are equipped with a Country Horn and a quieter City Horn. In the United States, Chrysler Corp. specifies a limit for its horns: the sound level as measured at 4 inches from the horn shall be at least 125 decibels!
Without insistence on proper design, increase in power becomes synonymous with increase in noise. One reason for the jet noise problem is the escalation from the 12,000-pound-thrust DC-3 to the 41,000 pounds of thrust generated by the subsonic jets. The combined roar of jet exhaust, whine of jet compressors, and sounds of the turbines, generates more than 140 decibels at takeoff. Homes near airports may experience exposures of more than 100 decibels. Community complaints may begin at 90, and explode at 105!
Without people-oriented controls, the best that will happen is a freeze at levels undesirable to begin with, or an insignificant reduction. The airline industry is satisfied that its giant air buses will be no louder, perhaps an insignificant few decibels quieter, than current models. This satisfaction with maintaining the noisy status quo is also found in the air conditioning industry where air conditioner manufacturers are proud to tell the public that new, more powerful units are no noisier than the older, less powerful ones.
Though cities have the major responsibility for noise control, they do not have the authority to control most of the major noise sources. The Federal government, for example, has pre-empted air navigation and air traffic, and any noise limits (other than on the ground) must be set by a Federal agency. When the Village of Cedarhurst, Long Island, adjoining Kennedy Airport, tried to prohibit aircraft flights over itself at heights of less than 1,000 feet, it was overruled in the courts. When the Federal government failed to come up with noise limits, Ralph G. Caso, the Presiding Supervisor of the Town of Hempstead, also next to Kennedy Airport, took a more sophisticated tack. In self-defense against the low overflights from the pattern of takeoffs and landings, an ordinance was enacted that limited aircraft noise to an average level approximately that of trucks at 50 feet. To keep aircraft from being fined, suit was brought in 1963 by the Port of New York Authority, the airlines, and the FAA. Hempstead lost in the Federal courts because, in effect, the town ordinance would restrict the use of the airport and infringe on Federal regulation of air commerce.
If someone ran back and forth over your lawn or dashed through your living room, sometimes once a minute, and at any time of the day or night, you could have him arrested for trespassing. A plane flying twenty feet over your backyard is not trespassing. Not according to law. Trespass has been ruled out because the Supreme Court has said (US. vs. Causby) that land ownership is limited. Until that ruling, the owner of a piece of land acquired "ad coelum" ownership, ownership to the sky. This type of unrestricted ownership has no place in the modern world. Declared the Court, "The airspace apart from the immediate reaches above the land is part of the public domain." In effect, the airspace over one's property needed for the takeoff and landing of aircraft is navigable airspace, an aerial highway that cannot be restricted either by an individual or by the community.
If you raise chickens next to an airport, and the overflights are so low and so frequent as to cause your chickens to panic and kill themselves by dashing themselves against the walls of their pens, your constitutional rights have been denied—also by ruling in the case of US. vs. Causby. You can't get the planes to make less noise or fly higher or elsewhere. You can, however, be reimbursed for the dead chickens. You must then go and raise your chickens somewhere else. One farmer whose wife was given headaches because of low and frequent overflights, went to court and won damages to cover the cost of the aspirins.
It's not absolutely necessary to own chickens. If your home is made untenable because of low and frequent flights and you can prove a reduction in property values, you can sometimes win damages. But you may have to move to prove that your home is unlivable.
It is a sad commentary on our way of life that the signs of a successful airport operation are the abandoned homes and schools that surround the facility.