Noise is the No. 1 reason New Yorkers call 311 \u2014 from traffic and construction to late-night music, according to the Department of Environmental Protection. <\/p>\n
But a new tool aims to help the city crack down on the constant commotion.<\/p>\n
The city\u2019s Department of Environmental Protection has launched NYCNoise, a free app that lets users log sound issues in their neighborhoods.<\/p>\n
\u201cReport, especially anonymously \u2014 it\u2019d be wonderful. Hopefully it\u2019ll clean the city up and stop noise pollution,\u201d one resident said.<\/p>\n
The app measures noise levels in decibels over a five-second recording period but does not capture actual audio. <\/p>\n
Users instead select the noise source \u2014 such as loud music or traffic \u2014 after taking the measurement.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe big problem here is the cars with the big speakers,\u201d another resident said. \u201cThey just park, and you can hear it from four blocks away.\u201d<\/p>\n
Some say the tool fills a real need. <\/p>\n
\u201cYes, I think it\u2019s needed. Can I use it for neighbors? Yes, definitely,\u201d a resident said.<\/p>\n
Noise remains the most common 311 complaint, according to the DEP. <\/p>\n
Each app entry logs the time, date and location, giving the city more precise data than ever before.<\/p>\n
Still, not everyone is convinced.<\/p>\n
\u201cMost of the time when they do something like this, it\u2019s money poured into something that doesn\u2019t give you the results you want,\u201d one resident said.<\/p>\n
As more reports come in, the DEP plans to build a noise map to identify hotspots, allowing inspectors to target problem areas and ultimately reduce noise citywide.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Noise is the No. 1 reason New Yorkers call 311 \u2014 from traffic and construction to late-night music,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":51154,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[75,84,83,9,24,13920,12155,63],"class_list":{"0":"post-51153","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-manhattan","8":"tag-manhattan","9":"tag-manhattan-headlines","10":"tag-manhattan-news","11":"tag-new-york","12":"tag-new-york-city","13":"tag-noise","14":"tag-noise-complaints","15":"tag-nyc"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51153"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51153\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/51154"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}