Noise emission numbers and noise control system for Amsterdam

STEP-IT develops in cooperation with DHV a noise monitoring system to control noise emission of track and trams for the city of Amsterdam.

DHV Environment and Transportation BV received an order from the Environmental & Building Department of the city of Amsterdam to map the emission of trams in Amsterdams. Until now, trams were considered to be just one of the attributing factors in acoustical calculations for traffic noise. Amsterdam however has decided to pay specific attention to trams in noise mapping and action planning.

Noise emission of trams is dependent of track construction, track quality (rail roughness) and wheel quality (wheel roughness, flat spots), but in narrow curves also squeal noise occurs.

It is therefore not sufficient to determine the average noise emission once-only. The noise emission is, as is known, location dependent and also dependent of maintenance carried out on tram wheels. DHV therefore suggested to develop a monitoringsystem, in addition to detailed one-off measurements for determination of the characteristics of, for example, specific track constructions.

With the system the quality of the track can be monitored from a mobile measurement tramcar and with fixed masurement stations the quality of the tram wheels.
With this integrated system the public transport company GVB obtains a definitive grip on the noise production of trams in the city of Amsterdam.

DHV and STEP-IT collaborate in this development project.

This article has also been published in the Ambient Noise Newsletter, DHV Environment and Transportation BV, September 20 2005, year 1, number 2 (in Dutch).

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