Article,
The effects of vegetation on the perception of traffic noise
Applied Acoustics, (1999)
Abstract
This study was designed to investigate the effects of vegetation on
the perception of sound using both real traffic sources and reproduced
recorded traffic noise. Subjective assessments were made of traffic
noise at locations within three roadside sites with varying degrees
of visual screening by vegetation and at the Transport Research Laboratory’s
Noise Barrier Test Facility (NBTF) using an artificial sound source.
It was shown that for the same noise exposure level average ratings
of noisiness were higher where the degree of visual screening was
higher. That is, on average listeners were more sensitive to noise
when the source was visually screened. It was further shown that
the visual attractiveness of vegetation did not appear to benefit
noise sensitivity.
