Department of Community Health and Epidemiology, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada.
J Urban Health. 2012 Dec;89(6):1017-30. doi: 10.1007/s11524-012-9721-7.
Recent trends towards the intensification of urban development to increase urban densities and avoid sprawl should be accompanied by research into the potential for related health impacts from environmental exposure. The objective of the current study was to examine the effect of the built environment and land use on levels of environmental noise. Two different study areas were selected using a combination of small area census geography, land use information, air photography, and ground-truthing. The first study area represented residential land use and consisted of two- to three-story single-family homes. The second study area was characteristic of mixed-use urban planning with apartment buildings as well as commercial and institutional development. Study areas were subdivided into six grids, and a location was randomly selected within each grid for noise monitoring. Each location was sampled four times over a 24-h day, resulting in a total of 24 samples for each of the two areas. Results showed significant variability in noise within study areas and significantly higher levels of environmental noise in the mixed-use area. Both study areas exceeded recommended noise limits when evaluated against World Health Organization guidelines and yielded average noise events values in the moderate to serious annoyance range with the potential to obscure normal conversation and cause sleep disturbance.
最近，城市发展呈现出强化趋势，以提高城市密度，避免无序扩张，与此同时，还应该研究环境暴露对相关健康影响的潜力。本研究的目的是检验建筑环境和土地利用对环境噪声水平的影响。使用小区域人口普查地理、土地利用信息、航空摄影和实地核实相结合的方法，选择了两个不同的研究区域。第一个研究区域代表住宅土地利用，由两到三层的独栋住宅组成。第二个研究区域具有混合用途的城市规划特点，有公寓楼以及商业和机构发展。研究区域被细分为六个网格，在每个网格内随机选择一个位置进行噪声监测。每个位置在 24 小时的一天中进行四次采样，两个区域的每个区域总共采集了 24 个样本。结果表明，研究区域内的噪声存在显著差异，混合用途区域的环境噪声水平明显更高。在评估世界卫生组织指南时，两个研究区域都超过了推荐的噪声限值，产生的平均噪声事件值处于中度到严重干扰范围，有可能掩盖正常对话并导致睡眠障碍。
