Revisiting the Concept of Quietness in the Urban Environment-Towards Ecosystems' Health and Human Well-Being.

Aggelos Tsaligopoulos,Chris Economou,Stella Kyvelou,Yiannis G Matsinos,Aimilia Karapostoli,Nefta-Eleftheria Votsi

doi:10.3390/ijerph18063151

Abstract

There is plenty of proof that environmental noise is a major pollutant in the urban environment. Several approaches were successfully applied for its calculation, visualization, prediction and mitigation. The goal of all strategy plans regards its reduction and the creation of quietness. This study aims to revisit the concept of quietness in the urban environment and attempts to portray a new understanding of the specific phenomena. “Quietness” as a term retains an ambiguity, and so far, it can be described as the lack of something, meaning the lack of noise that is portrayed by means of intensity. Several studies describe quietness as the combination of perceptual soundscape elements and contextual factors that can be quantified, combined, weighed and used as indicators of healthy soundscapes. In this research, the focus is on setting aside all indicators, either measuring the intensity or contextual ones and use solely quantifiable metrics regarding the acoustic environment, thus introducing a new composite index called the composite urban quietness index (CUQI). After testing the CUQI, in order to verify the results of previous research regarding the identification of quiet Areas in the city of Mytilene (Lesbos Island, Greece), the study concludes that CUQI is efficiently functioning even in this early stage of development.

Highlights

Simultaneous transmission of multiple sound sources is always happening in the urban environment [1]
The Agias established that the interdisciplinary collaboration of ecologists and architects/urban deEirinis Park and the Karapanagioti Park were the two top choices
Results provided by the calculations of composite urban quietness index (CUQI) seem to give very similar results with the previous protocol used for the identification of urban quiet areas

Summary

Introduction

Simultaneous transmission of multiple sound sources is always happening in the urban environment [1]. This combined emission can cause increased intensity levels, which can be interpreted as noise. The negative impact of this pollutant on the physical and mental health of citizens [2], on the communicational efforts of the avifauna [3,4] and on the quality of the overall environment [5,6,7] shaped the need to create and manage urban quiet areas [8]. Lden refers to the day-evening-night noise indicator used for overall annoyance assessment. The content of this definition offers an opportunity for further discussion regarding the concept of

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Conclusion