The Environmental Protection team at Huntingdonshire District Council, working in partnership with Luminus Group, took their 2007 Noise Action Week roadshow to St Ives and Huntingdon.
The team were promoting the ninth national Noise Action Week which is co-ordinated by the National Society for Clean Air and Environmental Protection. Noise Action Week helps to provide a focus for noise education and is welcomed by noise managers for the opportunity it gives them to take information to the public and to answer any questions about neighbourhood noise. This year the roadshow operated under the slogan “One person’s sound is another person’s headache!” which was the winning slogan in the 2006 competition won by Joanna Runnegar.
Noise can affect the quality of life of everyone and the team were on hand to give advice to anyone who felt they had a noise problem. Promoting a responsible attitude towards noise and raising awareness of the social impacts of noise is essential in building sustainable communities.
Pam Mackinnon, a dog behaviour expert, was kept busy on the roadshow giving advice and answering questions with particular regard to barking dogs, a constant complaint to the Environmental Health department. It is widely accepted that proactive education on noise is fundamental in tackling neighbour noise problems. The team were also handing out stress-balls and bookmarks to highlight the stress that neighbour noise can cause - it also provided customers with the telephone number and the website of the council in case they had a noise problem in the future!
Neighbourhood noise is the most frequently complained about noise problem and this is often caused by thoughtless or anti-social behaviour. A key message from the environmental protection team is that individuals are responsible for the noise they make in their own homes and the impact this may have on others. Sometimes though, the expectations of complainants are high and therefore it is necessary to balance the minor effects of some neighbourhood noise against what would generally be tolerable to a reasonable person, otherwise it would never be possible to undertake routine operations such as mowing a lawn.
This year’s competition was to write new lyrics to the song ‘Smoke gets in your eyes’ with the title ‘Noise gets in your ears’. This was won by Terry Schooling with close second place going to Pete Lummis. The Second prize was donated by Luminus Group who also donated a second prize for the Noise Action Week survey for which the results will be available in Autumn issue of District Wide and on our website at: www.huntsdc.gov.uk/NoiseActionWeek.