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| Year : 2012
| Volume
: 14 | Issue : 57 | Page
: 52-57 |
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| Investigation of the relationship between aircraft noise and community annoyance in China |
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Di Guoqing1, Liu Xiaoyi1, Shi Xiang2, Li Zhengguang1, Lin Qili1
1 Department of Environmental Science and Institute of Environmental Pollution and Control Technology, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China
2 Information and Electronic Engineering, Zhejiang University of Science and Technology, Hangzhou, China
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| Date of Web Publication | 18-Apr-2012 |
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A survey of community annoyance induced by aircraft noise exposure was carried out around Hangzhou Xiaoshan International Airport. To investigate the relationship curves between aircraft noise and the percentage of "highly annoyed" persons in China and also to get annoyance threshold of aircraft noise in China. Noise annoyance induced by aircraft noise exposure was assessed by 764 local residents around the airport using the International Commission on Biological Effect of Noise (ICBEN) scale. The status quo of aircraft noise pollution was measured by setting up 39 monitoring points. The interpolation was used to estimate the weighted effective continuous perceived noise levels (LWECPN) in different areas around the airport, and the graph of equal noise level contour was drawn. The membership function was used to calculate the annoyance threshold of aircraft noise. Data were analyzed using SPSS 16.0 and Origin 8.0. The results showed that if LWECPN was 64.3 dB (Ldn was 51.4 dB), then 15% respondents were highly annoyed. If LWECPN was 68.1 dB (Ldn was 55.0 dB), then 25% respondents were highly annoyed. The annoyance threshold of aircraft noise (LWECPN) was 73.7 dB, while the annoyance threshold of a single flight incident instantaneous noise level (LAmax) was 72.9 dB. People around the airport had felt annoyed before the aircraft noise LWECPN reached the standard limit. Keywords: Aircraft noise, annoyance threshold, noise annoyance
How to cite this article:
Guoqing D, Xiaoyi L, Xiang S, Zhengguang L, Qili L. Investigation of the relationship between aircraft noise and community annoyance in China. Noise Health 2012;14:52-7 |
How to cite this URL:
Guoqing D, Xiaoyi L, Xiang S, Zhengguang L, Qili L. Investigation of the relationship between aircraft noise and community annoyance in China. Noise Health [serial online] 2012 [cited 2023 Mar 30];14:52-7. Available from: https://www.noiseandhealth.org/text.asp?2012/14/57/52/95132 |
| Introduction | |  |
It has been a great concern of the society that aircraft noise exerts psychological and physiological impacts on human beings. The rapid growth in the number of domestic airports, scale and number of flights in recent years lead to the increasingly stronger influence of aircraft noise. Comprehensive social surveys were conducted among the residents around airports in many countries to evaluate the effects of aircraft noise on human beings. Aircraft noise evaluation indexes vary from country to country, which apart from such common ones as day-night equivalent sound pressure level (Ldn) [1] and weighted effective continuous perceived noise level (LWECPN), [2] also include day-evening-night equivalent sound pressure level (Lden), [3],[4] 24-h equivalent A-weighted sound pressure level (LAeq,24h), [5] sound exposure level (LAE), [6] perceived noise level (LPN), [7] maximum A-weighted sound pressure level (LAmax), [8] etc. Results have shown that there is significant correlation between the above listed evaluation indexes and community annoyance induced by aircraft noise. In many countries, the relationship curves between aircraft noise and the percentage of "highly annoyed" persons (%HA) have been established on the basis of social surveys, which are helpful to perfect the evaluation standards of the aircraft noise around the airports. [1],[2],[3],[6],[7],[9],[10] No such curves have yet been built in China.
For the new trends of domestic aircraft noise pollution, the characteristics of Chinese community and the investigations on the influences that the aircrafts exert on residents, establishing the relationship curves between domestic aircraft noise and %HA is of great significance for China to conduct scientific and reasonable airport planning and distribution, make noise-related policies and set or revise the related standards in the upcoming stage.
This study established the relationship curves between %HA and  of aircraft noise by measuring aircraft noise and carrying out a survey on community annoyance induced by the aircraft noise exposure around Hangzhou Xiaoshan International Airport. Besides, the membership function was adopted to calculate the annoyance threshold of aircraft noise  as well as a single flight incident instantaneous noise level (LAmax).
| Methods | | |
Noise measurement
According to the flight table of Hangzhou Xiaoshan International Airport, one-week noise monitor was carried out with the reference of measurement of aircraft noise around airport (GB/T9661-1988). As shown in [Figure 1], 39 monitor points were set around the airport, and the longitude and latitude of each point were obtained by GPS. The measurement was performed for 24 h, recording effective perceived noise level (LEPN) of each single flight incident. The average LEPN of all flight incidents is calculated according to the following formula:
where LEPN represents the effective perceived noise level of a single flight incident; N1 represents the number of flights during the day time period (6:00-19:00); N2 represents the number of flights during the evening time period (19:00-22:00); N3 represents the number of flights during the night time period (22:00-6:00). | Figure 1: Noise monitoring points around the airport and one-week equal noise level contour. The dash line is the airport runway center line. Dots and the numbers are 39 monitoring points. The noise levels are respectively 80 dB, 75 dB, 70 dB, 65 dB, 60 dB from inside to outside
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One-day LWECPN [11] is calculated as follows:
where  stands for the average LEPN of all flight incidents in a day.  can be obtained using the following formula:
where  denotes the average LEPN of all flight incidents in a week; N1i, N2i, N3i respectively represent the number of flights in three different periods in a week; i represents a certain day and T stands for 7 days in a week.  of these monitoring points in a week are calculated according to Formula (1), (2) and (3).
Equal noise level contour
The following formula once applied in the aircraft noise evaluation of Beijing Capital International Airport showed the relationship between the distance and LEPN of a single flight incident:
where S represents the vertical distance from the monitoring point to the flight track on land; α, β are two parameters perpendicular to the flight track in a certain direction. In the same flight incident, according to the known LEPN of two monitoring points which are perpendicular to the same flight track and with different distances from the Runway Center Line, the values of α and β, which are on the line between the two monitoring points, can be obtained from Formula (4). The values of  of these points are achieved by using Formula (1), (2) and (3). With the help of interpolation, the points with the same  values of 60 dB, 65 dB, 70 dB, 75 dB, 80 dB were found and plotted on the coordinate graph of the airport. All the points with the same  value were connected and the graph of equal noise level contour was formed [Figure 1].
Social survey
The social survey on community annoyance induced by aircraft noise exposure was assessed by local residents from 13 villages of 3 towns, within 6 km away from the airport. Totally 1500 questionnaires were issued and 1252 returns were received, with a final response rate of 83%. 764 valid questionnaires, with the selection of aircraft noise as the major one, were left. Indoor as well as outdoor face-to-face investigations were conducted among the respondents who were the residents around the airport. Each respondent was required to fill in the family address, of which the longitude and latitude were plotted. Based on [Figure 1],  of each respondent can be obtained.
The questionnaire was designed on the basis of Acoustics-Assessment of Noise annoyance by means of social and Socio-Acoustics surveys (GB/Z 21233-2007/ISO/TS 15666:2003). The ICBEN scale was applied and the respondents were asked questions like "thinking about the last 12 months or so, when you are here at home, how much does noise from noise source bother, disturb, or annoy you, by selecting one of 11 categories from 0 (not annoyed at all) to 10 (extremely annoyed)". The indoor respondents were also required to select the answer on the 11-point numerical scale to show how much aircraft noise bothered or annoyed them when an outdoor single flight incident took place.
The calculation of %HA
"Highly annoyed" (%HA) was set as the assessment basis of noise annoyance. [2],[11],[12],[13],[14],[15] It is defined as follows: Annoyance responses to aircraft noise were elicited by means of an 11-point numerical scale. Responses in the top three out of 11 categories (10, 9 and 8) are "highly annoyed". [14],[15] The possible differences between proportions (e.g., proportion highly annoyed) were tested using χ2 tests. [16] Differences associated with P values below 0.05 were considered statistically significant. The relationship between %HA and the aircraft noise around the airport was established by the logistic model. Data were analyzed using SPSS 16.0 and Origin 8.0.
The calculation of annoyance threshold
The fuzzy mathematics is widely applied in the researches on annoyance both in domestic and abroad. [17],[18],[19],[20] Based on the equally interval principle and annoyance levels offered by the respondents, the membership function of the annoyance (measured by 11-point numerical scale) is given as follows:
Where μ0, μ1, μ2, μ3, μ4, μ5, μ6, μ7, μ8, μ9, μ10 represent 11 categories of "0-10" annoyance, respectively; 0, 0.1, 0.2, 0.3, 0.4, 0.5, 0.6, 0.7, 0.8, 0.9, 1.0 are membershi P values corresponding to 11 categories.
Where P i is the probability of annoyance corresponding to the central noise level (L i); n ij is the frequency of j (annoyance degree) at the sound level of L i ; μj is the membershi P value when annoyance degree is j. The noise annoyance threshold (EL) can be obtained using Formula (7):
| Results | | |
Among 764 valid questionnaires, 340 respondents conducted it indoor and 424 respondents outdoor. The ratio of male to female was 9:11. [Table 1] shows %HA at different ranges of  (P<0.0001).
The polynomial model can be expressed as follows:
where y expresses the percentage of "highly annoyed" persons (%HA); x represents  or Ldn (dB) of aircraft noise; a, b, c are coefficients. The coefficients and coefficient of determination R 2 are listed in [Table 2], among which R 2 is 0.99. [Figure 2] shows the relationship curve between %HA and aircraft noise  .
Respondents having complained about environmental issues were excluded, 628 valid samples were analyzed in the same way. The coefficients are listed in [Table 2], and the comparison with the studies of other countries is shown in [Figure 3], thus comes the conclusion, if the value of Ldn is in the 50.0-80.0 dB range, then %HA obtained in this study is little higher than those in the studies of Korea, Holland and America. If Ldn >80.0 dB, the result is rather close to that of Holland and America. [2],[3],[10],[21]
Annoyance probability values of different genders and various  were calculated by means of membership function [Table 3] and [Table 4]. The annoyance threshold of aircraft noise  was 73.9 dB (764 valid samples) without any gender difference. Complainants excluded, the annoyance threshold of aircraft noise  was 73.7 dB (628 valid samples). From indoor survey (340 valid samples), the annoyance threshold of a single flight incident instantaneous noise level LAmax exposure was 72.9 dB (male 73.4 dB and female 72.1 dB). Female's was a little lower than male's.
| Discussion | | |
The relationship between  and community annoyance
Among the evaluation indicators, LWECPN only considers individual aircraft events when the over-flight happens, while the value of Ldn depends on the influence of background noise levels and the number of flights. [3],[12],[21] Derivation of Ldn from LWECPN measured data using a transformation rule was carried out to compute noise levels in Ldn from only aircraft noise exposures. It was converted by the following equation: [2],[22]
In the survey, respondents of the selected valid questionnaires all chose aircraft noise as the major one. Thus, with the reference of Eq. (9),  can be converted to Ldn, which can also be fitted with %HA by polynomial fit [Figure 3]. The coefficients and R 2 are also listed in [Table 2]. [Figure 3] shows that when Ldn <60.0 dB, %HA grows slower than that in the case when Ldn <60.0 dB, which indicates that the effect of aircraft noise annoyance is found to be relatively small when Ldn <60.0 dB.
[Figure 3] indicates the comparison with the results of social surveys on community annoyance induced by aircraft noise from other countries such as Holland, America and Korea. As shown in [Figure 3], when Ldn >50.0 dB, the %HA obtained in this study is higher than those in other four. [2],[3],[10],[21] When Ldn >70.0 dB, the %HA in this study is far too high. In the survey, 17.8% of the respondents had complained about environmental issues, all of whom were exposed to  >75.0 dB. Among them, 82.2% had lived around the airport for at least 5 years and were extremely sensitive to the aircraft noise.
Some studies suggested that the increase in the number of flights will directly lead to a sharp rise of human annoyance, especially night flights and early morning flights. [7],[23],[24] According to the statistical data from the airport in Hangzhou, an average increase of 31% in flights number was recorded from 2001 to 2004; 25% from 2004 to 2007; 24% from 2007 to 2009. The expansion of the airport together with the air traffic control during the day time inevitably lead to the growth of night flights year by year. According to the follow-up research conducted by western countries on the influence of aircraft noise, they have found a decrease of Ldn necessary for evoking a constant percentage of respondents being highly annoyed by aircraft noise, which indicates that the annoyance of residents exposed to aircraft noise increased over years. [12],[25],[26] Without regard to the community difference, the community annoyance induced by aircraft noise has seen its gradual increase, which is stricken a chord by the results of American in 1994; Holland in 2001 and Korea in 2007 shown in [Figure 3]. It is also suggested in other studies that with the progress of sound level, age and residence time, noise annoyance had been on a steady rise. [9],[10],[13],[27] Among the 628 respondents in this study, people above the age of 40 made up 24.2%; and people who lived around the airport for at least 5 years made up 91.1%, which caused the higher %HA of this study than those of other three countries'.
The Federal Interagency Committee on Urban Noise (1980) and Federal Interagency Committee on Noise (1992) recommended criterion of incompatibility for residential-land usage is that no more than 15% of the people should be highly or more annoyed by transportation noise. [28] According to the results of the survey [Figure 3], if %HA is 15%, then  and Ldn will be 64.3 dB and 51.4 dB respectively. If %HA is controlled below 25%, then  and Ldn will be 68.1 dB and 55.0 dB respectively.  is 1.9 dB lower than 70 dB, the standard limit for the first class area (noise-sensitive buildings as residential, cultural and educational areas), according to Standard of aircraft noise for environment around airport (GB9660-88). It indicates that 25% people have felt highly annoyed when the aircraft noise  exposure hasn't reached the standard limits.
Annoyance threshold of  and L Amax exposure
The annoyance threshold of aircraft noise  was 73.7 dB, 1.3 dB lower than 75 dB, the standard limit for the second class area, according to standard of aircraft noise for environment around airport (GB9660-88), which indicated that people had felt annoyed before  reached the standard limit of that region. The standard limit is lower than that of Western countries, represented by America [29] (Ldn =65 dB, LWECPN =78 dB). The current research has shown that annoyance responses in low background noise regions are much higher than those in high background noise regions; even though aircraft noise levels are the same LWECPN . [30] The areas investigated in this study were in suburb around the airport, far away from traffic arteries. So the background noise was comparatively lower. Most of the residences were private constructed without effective soundproof materials. Consequently, sound-insulation was less effective than that of the standard of the Western buildings [29] (According to the standard, the sound transmission loss of the living and school buildings around the airport ΔL dn should be equal or greater than 15 dB). Thus the aircraft noise exerted greater influence on the noise environment indoor and activities: studying, working and sleeping.
| Conclusion | | |
Taking into consideration the characteristics of Chinese community, based on the aircraft noise measurement around the airport and the investigation on community annoyance induced by aircraft noise, the relationship curves between %HA and  (Ldn ) were established, and the membership function was adopted to calculate annoyance threshold.
The results showed that if  was 64.3 dB (Ldn was 51.4 dB), then 15% respondents were highly annoyed. If  was 68.1 dB (Ldn was 55.0 dB), then 25% respondents were highly annoyed.  was 68.1 dB, 1.9 dB lower than 70 dB, the standard limit of the first class area according to standard of aircraft noise for environment around airport (GB9660-88). It indicated that 25% respondents had felt highly annoyed before the aircraft noise  reached the standard limit.
The annoyance threshold of aircraft noise  was 73.7 dB by means of numerical scale, 1.3 dB lower than 75 dB, the standard limit of the second class area according to standard of aircraft noise for environment around airport (GB9660-88). It showed that people had felt annoyed before the aircraft noise  reached the standard limit. The annoyance threshold of a single flight incident instantaneous noise level LAmax was 72.9 dB.
The current standard limits of aircraft noise around the airport and the way of zoning in standard of aircraft noise for environment around airport (GB9660-88) do not quite apply to current China. Thus further investigation on annoyance among people is recommended to conduct around other airports, to acquire the status quo of the community annoyance induced by aircraft noise. The results would help support the aircraft noise related policies and standards.
| Acknowledgment | | |
This study was funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NO.10604048) and the National Public Benefit Research Foundation of China (NO.200809142). Special gratitude also goes to Zhejiang Environmental Monitoring Center for supplying the monitoring data from Hangzhou Xiaoshan International Airport.
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Correspondence Address:
Di Guoqing
Nongshenghuan Building B379, Zijingang Campus, Zhejiang University, Yuhangtang Road 866, Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province
China
 Source of Support: National Natural Science Foundation of China (NO.10604048) and the National Public Benefit Research Foundation of China (NO.200809142), Conflict of Interest: None  | Check |
DOI: 10.4103/1463-1741.95132
[Figure 1], [Figure 2], [Figure 3]
[Table 1], [Table 2], [Table 3], [Table 4] |
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