Themes
Choose a theme for your event, thinking about the audience you want to target and the message you want to get across:
Premises noise
Landlords and Tenants - Transient tenants are less likely to integrate into communities and therefore may be less considerate of surroundings and neighbours, and poor sound insulation can exacerbate noise problems. Use Noise Action Week to work with both social and private landlords, to manage and avoid problems from noisy tenants.
Studentification – With the growing number of students reaching higher education over recent years, many cities and towns have areas with a high student population. Noise Action Week is a great opportunity to focus local debate around managing noise from student properties, improve community relations and launch or highlight initiatives.
Licensed Premises – With more flexible licensing hours, many premises providing outdoor space and complaints about street noise caused by people leaving premises, Noise Action Week is an opportunity to engage landlords and customers in reducing the impact their activities can have on nearby residents.
Neighbour Noise
Loud music and parties – Music, house parties and noise from TVs and audio equipment are some of the most commonly complained about domestic noises. Why not use Noise Action Week to promote existing, or launch new, services aimed at encouraging neighbours to turn it down.
Dogs – Dog barking is another of the most complained about neighbour noises. Local authorities and housing organisations have run very successful initiatives offering advice and support on reducing this problem through appropriate dog care and training – and pets are always popular with the press.
Alarms- Alarms going off accidentally can be extremely annoying – often waking up an entire neighbourhood. Many local authorities have used Noise Action Week to promote local key holder registration schemes and encourage residents to sign up.
Transport Noise
Transport Noise – In our larger cities and busiest roads, noise action planning is set to work towards reducing the impact of traffic noise. Noise Action Week is an opportunity to raise awareness of traffic noise and its impact on health, and the role all can play be choosing quieter transport where practical, avoiding aggressive, noisy driving, and choosing quieter vehicles and quieter tyres. For more information on quieter tyres see www.bettertyres.org.uk. To find out about Noise Action Planning see EPUK’s Managing Transport Noise in Cities leaflet.
Quiet Areas- As part of noise action planning, many large cities will soon be working to identify quiet open spaces (those with a low level of mechanised noise). Noise Action Week provides an opportunity to get people in your area thinking about local open spaces and where they go to get peace and quiet. See EPUK’s report on quietening open space in cities.
Health and Safety
Headphones and Hearing- Research shows many people are listening to headphones at high levels and risk hearing damage as a result. Noise Action Week is an opportunity to raise awareness of these risks.
Noise at Work – According to government figures, over 1 million people are exposed to dangerous noise levels at work in Great Britain. Noise Action Week is an opportunity to reinforce the message to owners of entertainment venues that noise exposure needs to be managed.
