The Blue Acoustics Team recently visited Gloucester to carry out a BS4142 survey to quantify the noise impact of activities at a busy freight depot, on a number of nearby dwellings on the opposite side of the Gloucester canal.
The BS4142 survey was required in response to a statuary abatement notice served on the site. The site distributes products around the country by lorries of various sizes. Lories arrive early in the evening and are parked up and left. They are then loaded through the night by fork lift trucks, ready for the morning when they leave around 06:00 to ensure they hit the motorways before local traffic volumes swell during the morning rush hour.
We carried out attended noise monitoring during the busiest periods of the day and night, and long term unattended monitoring to establish background noise levels at the receptors.
We attended the site throughout the night time period so we could attain a clear understanding of the freight timetable and offending noise sources. Specific noise measurements were taken at various positions to gain a better understanding of how the noise propagated around the area, and used within our prediction model.
We found that there was an adverse noise impact at night, caused by the use of fork lift trucks. The freight yard had a very pitted surface and this caused the forks to rattle when unladen, generating significant noise which carried over the canal towards the dwellings. A noise barrier was deemed ineffective as the canopy over the yard was very high, and would reflect noise over any intervening object. We then looked at reducing the noise level at source and concluded the survey by recommending alternative loading locations by night, and that the forks be fitted with a damping material to minimise fork noise.
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The team at Blue Acoustics has extensive experience across the full spectrum of noise related consultancy. All staff are trained to MSc level in Applied Acoustics and are members of the Institute of Acoustics, which is considered the industry gold standard for acoustics professionals.
We regularly service clients throughout the UK, in particular Birmingham, Bristol, Exeter, Devon and Somerset. We cover a range of disciplines such as Noise Surveys, Noise at Work Assessments, Industrial Noise Surveys, Residential Noise Surveys, Sound Insulation Testing, Hospital Acoustics, School Acoustics and Office Acoustics.
To book your initial consultation please call us on 0333 444 3403 or drop us an email at info@blueacoustics.co.uk.