It's hard to take noise pollution seriously when you so much as read the comments here after reading and agreeing with much of the article. Yes I believe living under an airport to be detrimental to anyone's sanity, but yet it devolves quickly into an agoraphobic hand wringing competition going from city sirens, to cars in general, to the neighbors dog barking sporadically. There are prices to pay for living in city centers, suburbs versus living in the woods away from society entirely. We exchange a tranquil peace of living in a shack in Montana vs living in SF/NYC/etc/etc and making more money and all the conveniences that come with living in these cities. What I gather out of a lot of HN comments about noise pollution is a spectrum of desire to be isolated from humans while living in metropolitan areas all the way to being upset that the neighbors kid drives a shitty car or they hate the sounds of animals fighting and barking.
> There are prices to pay for living in city centers
These are the prices we pay today in the US, but they don't have to be. Other countries like The Netherlands and Switzerland take noise pollution more seriously and show it's possible to have quieter cities. Even among huge cities it's possible: Tokyo is much quieter than NYC.
We don't need to make people choose between living in dense, efficient spaces vs calm and quiet. Making urban living more comfortable is a net benefit: the people that live there will be happier, people that wanted to live there but avoided due to noise will now have that option, and people outside of cities would be unaffected. Why accept this as just the way it is when plenty of other cities have shown it can be better?
This video shows what it's like when a city takes noise more seriously (in this case, the whole of The Netherlands). It focuses on cars, but apartment noises can be handled too with building codes. https://youtu.be/CTV-wwszGw8
I've noticed that my reaction to other people's noises differs significantly depending on the type of noise.
If my neighbor is renovating at 10pm because she's a single mom trying to flip a house while also working 2 jobs, I turn on a noise generator in solidarity. If that same neighbor starts listening to music with too much bass, my initial reaction is more negative until I realize I may be creating noise too when I'm yelling at video games or sports and she may not appreciate hearing that.
I believe a strong sense of community is the missing link in a lot of these stories. Understanding is typically a necessary step before acceptance, and most of us don't have the time or take the time to establish that understanding. The world is so busy these days, and our time so filled by all forms of electronics, the only time we run into each other anymore is if we happen to be working on our gardens at similar times.
People don't move to cities for "conveniences". They do so because it's necessary for their livelihood. It's also dramatically better for the environment and economy for people to live in denser settings. Life shouldn't be so miserable, and the idea that the city is an ~aesthetic~ rather than a necessity needs to die as soon as possible.
It is necessary to just live in pods, take our soma and encase ourselves in silent solitude surely the world will become a better place with no external problems. Only dissidents and bad guys would disagree i'm sure.
