I count myself as having been dealt a reasonable hand by the good Lord; despite the recession, the two companies I am involved with are still going (in itself an achievement these days). I have a lovely family and support the best football team in the world, Leyton Orient (it’s all relative).
More to the point, I live about 1.5km from my office and walk in every day past huddles of folk at bus stops either on their way direct to work or, perish the thought, to the underground to be ‘sardined’ to the office. Walking there and back five or six days a week however, has taught me something I had never given much thought to; the level of noise pollution in London is unbearable.
OK, you expect unbearable noise on the Euston Road during peak times; but not on roads which are generally ‘quiet’ by London standards. And herein lies the problem, the noise levels are not generated by the volume of traffic but rather by the volume level of individual drivers. A white van is not by definition a dangerous beast. But when the driver has been forced to stop at a zebra crossing to enable a mother with toddler to cross, and is angry by being held up for five seconds and then sets off as if he were in pole position at Le Mans, the beast becomes a behemoth if you happen to be walking next to the incident.
A group of schoolchildren may seem an innocuous target but do I really have to listen to their ‘conversation’ from a distance; and the more the distance is narrowed the more unbearable it is. And why is it that the most powerful motorbikes make the least noise of their fraternity? A rider with the mother of all exhausts knows how to control their machine in populated areas whereas the ubiquitous pizza delivery chap on a machine that should be hanging in a motorbike museum rides at 60kmh in second gear. The noise is simply intolerable.
This literally orchestrated attack on my senses is but an hors d’oeuvres in preparation for the final ear drum splitter – the emergency service siren. While I feel for the poor soul in the back of the ambulance who needs to get to hospital quickly; is it fair to ask him or her to arrive at A&E with split ear drums? Would the police car not get through stationary traffic at the same speed if the siren was down a notch?
The truth is that society’s aggression is manifested in many different ways but you never hear anyone talking about noise pollution. Maybe it’s because they can’t hear themselves think.