Fitness Files: Noise around us has reached harmful levels

Last week, I ran through my neighborhood streets to a cacophony — garbage truck’s rattle and squeal, construction project’s boom and smack, leaf blower’s loud whine, tree trimmer’s shrill buzz, lawnmower’s drone, diesel engines’ rattle, car’s hum, motorcycle’s peel, passenger jets’ distant roar and sirens’ screams.

While I accept these sounds as Newport normal, I have experienced a contrast.

I am thinking of the escape to our mountain cabin on Friday nights when I was still teaching. I would haul a satchel of student papers, expecting to spend parts of the weekend correcting.

Imagine my surprise when I would reach for the next paper, certain there was more, and realize I was done.

A thick blanket of nighttime silence envelops small communities in the San Bernardino Mountains. The stillness made me speedy and productive.

Returning to last week’s run, I persevered through miles, feeling slightly jangled by the racket.

So I wondered if the din affects our health.

In the article “Noise,” the American Speech-Language-Hearing Assn.’s first sentence is direct: “Loud noise can be very damaging to hearing.” Levels higher than 85 decibels can cause permanent hearing loss.

Under the heading “Painful,” or 150 to 120 decibels, the associatioin lists fireworks at three feet, guns, jets, jackhammers, sirens.

At “Extremely Loud,” or 110 to 90 decibels, it lists MP3 players, chainsaws, gas mowers, hand drills and passing motorcycles.

The American Speech-Language-Hearing Assn. instructs readers to recognize “dangerous noise levels” and uses the following to gauge those levels:

•Must raise voice to be heard

•Can’t hear someone three feet away

•Others’ speech sounds muffled after leaving

•Pain, ringing in ears upon leaving noisy atmosphere

Some of our upscale restaurants qualify.

Most often-cited effects of noise pollution, besides hearing loss, are sleep interruption, elevated cardiovascular risk, elevated blood pressure and a wide range of psychosocial problems.

Medscape.com, in “Noise Pollution: A Modern Plague,” points out that it’s impossible to become “used to” noise. Loudness is always a surprise attack on the senses.

Medscape says, “Studies suggest children seem to be most venerable to noise-induced hearing impairment.” In fact, in 2001, 12.5% of American children had impaired hearing, and 80% of children used personal music players at potentially dangerous volumes.

“Well-documented … large-scale investigations” conclude that hearing loss affects children’s communication, academic outcomes, behavior, emotional development and later job opportunities.

Doubly disquieting is that cap pistols and other toys can generate “sufficient sound levels to cause sudden and permanent hearing loss,” Medscape says.

And what about the rest of us? While writing these words, I experienced the continuous thunder of a neighbor’s leaf blower, the reverberation of airplanes and my husband’s response to late dinner — turning on the excitable voices of TV newscasters. Now a motorcycle is revving up, repeatedly.

Here is the real suburban noise problem: We cannot shut off these intrusions. “The term ‘annoyance’ does not begin to describe the wide range of noise-induced negative reactions including anger, disappointment, helplessness, distraction, agitation,” Medscape says.

We’re stuck, or are we?

People can make a difference. I credit the Airport Working Group, whose efforts gave us John Wayne Airport noise restrictions.

The Huffington Post’s F. Kaid Benfield, in “Urban Noise Pollution,” suggests cities mask the sound assault with trees, parks and natural habitats, considering noise as they do other pollutants. He recommends cities develop “comprehensive strategies” for noise control.

Wouldn’t we all thank our new city councils if they set park and density standards designed to restore our beautiful environment to its natural calm? I’ll keep an eye on council programs toward quieter communities, and will be grateful to report noise-abatement policies.

Newport Beach resident CARRIE LUGER SLAYBACK is a retired teacher who ran the Los Angeles Marathon at age 70, winning first place in her age group. Her blog is lazyracer@blogspot.com.