30-08-2017, 04:01 PM
As population increases and expanding metropolitan areas and more efficient modes of transport continue to push residential communities into areas formerly characterized as "rural", noise control is likely to become a more important issue for all communities local governments and their governments. The noise produced by human activities has been increasingly recognized as a serious and growing environmental and health problem. Acoustic pollution has been implicated in a variety of health disorders, ranging from stress and hypertension to permanent hearing loss. In addition, noise has been shown to cause psychological problems: "[t] he moderate levels of noise can increase anxiety, decrease the incidence of cooperative behavior, and increase the risk of hostile behavior in experimental subjects."
Noise events can happen at random - sometimes when a code enforcement officer with a sound level meter is not available. For those occasions, county law has a provision that establishes a noise disturbance violation. The noise disturbance criteria are more subjective and depend on the observations and testimony of witnesses and / or a code enforcement officer.
A noise disturbance, as defined by the Montgomery County Noise Act (56KB, PDF), is any sound that is:
• Unpleasant, annoying, offensive, noisy or unpleasant
• Unusual for the time of day or place where it is produced or heard
• Harmful to the health, comfort or safety of any person or to the reasonable enjoyment of the property or lawful conduct of the business due to the intensity
Under the law, it is illegal to create a noise disturbance anywhere during quiet hours, including multifamily buildings and town houses. The disturbance arrangement prohibits some noise disturbance anywhere at any time.
Noise events can happen at random - sometimes when a code enforcement officer with a sound level meter is not available. For those occasions, county law has a provision that establishes a noise disturbance violation. The noise disturbance criteria are more subjective and depend on the observations and testimony of witnesses and / or a code enforcement officer.
A noise disturbance, as defined by the Montgomery County Noise Act (56KB, PDF), is any sound that is:
• Unpleasant, annoying, offensive, noisy or unpleasant
• Unusual for the time of day or place where it is produced or heard
• Harmful to the health, comfort or safety of any person or to the reasonable enjoyment of the property or lawful conduct of the business due to the intensity
Under the law, it is illegal to create a noise disturbance anywhere during quiet hours, including multifamily buildings and town houses. The disturbance arrangement prohibits some noise disturbance anywhere at any time.