To comment scroll to the bottom of the entry. Your e-mail address and URL are optional fields.
2006 08 15
Night of the Living Air Conditioners
Considerable attention has been paid to the challenges of light pollution in the greater Toronto area and its effects on human and ecological health. Less attention, for some reason, is paid to the problem of noise pollution. The City of Toronto does enforce a rather comprehensive noise by-law, and in 2003 recognised "Noise Awareness Day", but for the most part the City treats noise as a nuisance rather than acknowledging the ways it can be a peace-destroying and debilitating urban intrusion.
Noise pollution in cities is not new. In Topophilia: A Study of Environmental Perception, Attitudes, and Values (Columbia University Press, 1974) the eminent geographer Yi-Fu Tuan reports that "according to Juvenal [the Roman satirist and poet] the incessant din of night traffic condemned sensitive Romans to everlasting insomnia," and describes cities throughout history as characterized by a "perpetual hum" of construction, toil, traffic, church bells, and street criers, producing a "total cacaphony." And yet, even if modern cities are not necessarily quantitatively more noisy than they have been historically, something important has changed. Tuan observes of modern cities that "little of the noise is human."
Where we live, in the Junction area of Toronto, the night is alive with the crashing and banging of train cars coupling and separating like great prehistoric beasts in the district's rail yards. It's a sound I enjoy, having lived as a child near the Greenwood TTC yards and having listened early each morning to the eerie, primordial shrill of the streetcars shunting to life, an urban echo of choruses of spring peepers calling from rural bogs and ox-bow lakes. There's an organic quality to these sounds, something that connects the city to its wilder roots, to the behemoth rising through the underbrush. They are sounds that sharpen, rather than muffle, the voices and silences of the city. They clarify the shape of the city, too, by attuning us to distance as well as danger. Despite their mechanical source, these sounds are human, or human-scaled, in the sense that they are both comprehensible and embodied.
At night I like to lie in bed listening into the darkness. A few weeks ago the city's crickets emerged from their carapaces and began to signal the summer's turning. They call all night, their voices stilled occasionally by footfalls or the low muttering of raccoons shambling along the laneway. The night wind rattles the leaves outside my window, until the Virginia Creeper divulges its secrets. In the distance a siren or a shout warns of distant dangers. I can hear for miles.
But last night I didn't hear any of these sounds. Last night I lay awake listening to the buffered blast of air conditioning units up and down the street. Entire legions could have marched up and down the hall, bagpipes furling, and I would not have heard a note. Raccoons could have coursed throughout the house tossing rice and cat food and I would not have known. A Katyusha could have landed in the living room and I would have remained somnolent because I was already drowing in white noise, subdued by one of the most inhuman sounds in the city, the sound of an air conditioner.
It is not that air conditioners aren't necessary in this city, especially when even the evenings offer no relief from the thick and oily air and the night smells of heated pavement and spoiled vegetation. But last night the temperature dipped to fifteen degrees Celsius, a cool night after a rain, a perfect temperature for sleeping with the windows open. It seemed to me that air conditioners were left on out of habit or a more troubling cringing away from the uncertainties of weather. After 2:00 am I reluctantly shut the window and turned on the overhead fan, knowing that otherwise there would be no sleeping at all. And so I missed sounds I don't even know about: shopping carts being dragged and dropped in the alley, raccoons tipping over the salvaged porch pillars in our back garden, sirens on Dundas Street, the rusty voice of our little old cat, Quint, crying to be let in. On another night or in another lifetime I might have missed the sound of a gunshot a block or a doorway away, or a child bumping down the stairs, or the stealthy thump of some intruder rummaging in the closets.
There are sounds in this city that awaken us to its shape and character moving around us, that bring the city into sharp aural relief, a soundscape as readable as any map. But there are other sounds that muffle and conceal, and that lull and deafen us to the city's movements. It seems to me that the worst of these is air conditioning units left on unnecessarily during cool summer nights.
Amy, perfect timing for this story. Our neighbours put in a “state-of-the-art” air-conditoner that is supposed to be quiet. Last night at 4:00 AM I could not stand its grinding any longer. Turned on the fan but was so annoyed I could not sleep. It seems they always have it on no matter what the temperature, even into November. Self-absorbed, inconsiderate !??!#$!??s.
Posted by on 08/15 at 10:04 AM
So true, and so unpleasant! On my block the houses are very close together and because the options for placing air conditioning compressors are so limited, almost every air conditioning unit (including ours) is located so that its sound (and exhaust) funnels up between the houses, which amplify both the noise and heat. The City of Toronto’s [url=”http://www.toronto.ca/legdocs/municode/1184_591.pdf”]
Noise By-Law[/url] does restrict allowable noise emissions from air conditioners, but the thresholds are well beyond the annoyance level.
I would never expect people to turn off their air conditioners when it’s truly hot outside, but it would be nice if people were somewhat aware of their impact on the neighbourhood’s peace, especially on cooler nights when it is both easier and cheaper to just open a window.
Listening into the night—what a lovely phrase. One of my best memories of childhood is of summer sounds drifting in through the open window of my bedroom at bedtime. There were bird songs and childrens’ voices, the sound of a rake or a push lawn mower. And there were the shunting and puffing sounds of steam engines as they assembled their loads of freight. And train whistles! Could there be a more mournful sound to signify the distance of far away places? Miles yet to be travelled? What a lullaby.
In the 1970s, composer R. Murray Schafer wrote about the environmental pollution of noise. He called our sonic environment the Soundscape and lamented its degredation by our machine culture. One of his most significant works on this theme is called, “North White”, commissioned by the National Youth Orchestra of Canada. Among the musical resources it calls for are: a number of 50 gallon oil drums, scrap metal plates as percussion and a single solo snowmobile positioned downstage centre—where the solo violinist usually stands.
Unfortunately, the full effect of the work could not be realized in the premiere performances and subsequent tour because fire regulators prohibited the actual ‘playing’ of the snowmobile which, in turn, eliminated the profound effect of oily blue-white clouds of exhaust billowing out from behind the procenium and into the floor level seats in the audience. However, the taped soundtrack substitute had the merit of being playable at arbitrary volumes. The snowmobile ‘player’—now a mime—dressed in full leathers and mirror shades.
I think there is an equivalent problem for our visual environment—call it the Viewscape. I don’t think of it in the same terms as does the Royal Astronomical Society (cited in the article). I think of it in terms of the conflicting overlayering of visual stimuli that creates so much cognitive noise and a compulsion to turn off and desensitize ourselves to our visual surroundings. As a photographer, I worry about people loosing the ability to actually look at and see images. Looking and seeing require a kind of inner silence and stilled expectation that is being deadened by our need to defend our mental privacy. We are inundated with pictures and video in the public space. What choice do we have but to turn ourselves off. But the effects are subtle, habit forming, lasting and ultimately very destructive.
People, earplugs cost 49 cents a pair, and a mask that covers your eyes costs about a buck. Unless you’re worried about not being able to hear a burglar-and Torontonians don’t believe in guns anyway-I suggest you invest in some. You will get much more satisfying results, much quicker, if you adapt to the world instead of expecting it to adapt to you.
Density = noise. If you want quiet, move to Terrace Bay. If you want to live in the city, learn to put up with the sounds of others, enlightened by the knowledge that you are just as noisy to them. In either case, stop wringing your hands. It’s the pastime of the useless.
Posted by on 08/19 at 03:36 PM
Now. Here are the words of someone who is either very young (and energetically abrasive) or very old (and dried up and misanthropically cracked).
In effect Shane says we should abrogate all responsibility for trying to shape our environment into a commodious and humane thing. I have a better suggestion: It would be even less expensive to get hold of a decent ice pick and stick it into our eyes and ears so that we needn’t be concerned at all about any of our auditory and visual surrounding; and we could save on the moving costs, stay where we are. Like someone in a Samuel Beckett play. This indeed is density of the first order.
First of all, Ed, it’s very poor debating form to begin with an ad hominem attack. That is a logical fallacy and can in no way be considered a rebuttal. A put-down, yes. A take-down, no way. There really is nothing else to say, as your reply doesn’t contain anything meaningful, apart from sarcasm and artsy posing.
If the previous posts had contained anything in the way of realistic suggestions, I would have addressed them as such. But most of it amounts to why-can’t-the-world-do-what-I-want-when-I-want whining, and is thus deserving of scorn. I don’t believe for a minute that these complainants don’t also have air conditioning (or would get it if they could), nor that they use it only when others want them to use it.
By the way, your aspersions and assumptions are not only petulant and immature, but wrong. I’m 37, and thus fit into neither of the age brackets you suggest. I do wonder at your own age, though. Because if you have any years at all under your belt, you should know that it is better to keep your mouth shut, and be thought a fool, than to open it, and remove all doubt.
If you do decide to put an ice pick through your head, though, go ahead. It’ll be quieter when you’re gone.
Posted by on {comment_date format=’%m/%d’} at {comment_date format=’%h:%i %A’}
Posted by on 08/19 at 06:22 PM
Gee. An putatively educated young and energetically abrasive person. Speaking of constructive suggestions, other than night shade(s) and ear plugs, what do you have to offer Shane? Do you really believe we inhabit a environmental heaven on earth in this town or are you saying you are an urban atheist? And we should all just shut up and subscribe to your despair?
Ed wrote: “Gee. An putatively educated young and energetically abrasive person.”
“An” putatively educated...? I’d say the one doing the posing is you, my friend. I, at least, don’t try to sound more educated than I am. By the way, if 37 is young to you, what constitutes old? And what constitutes middle?
Ed wrote: “Speaking of constructive suggestions, other than night shade(s) and ear plugs, what do *you* have to offer Shane?”
Which is exactly two more constructive suggestions than the whole boiling of you has managed to offer thus far. My third suggestion (relocation) is not quite as constructive, but still an option for those who feel they can’t take it anymore and can find work in smaller communities. If you want to take your own non-constructive “icepick” suggestion to heart, though, as I said, feel free.
Ed wrote: “Do you really believe we inhabit a environmental heaven on earth in this town or are you saying you are an urban atheist?”
“A” environmental Heaven? That’s as funny as Sylvester the Cat exclaiming, “Sufferin’ succotash! A egg!” or Bugs Bunny sounding out “sa-ba-taw-gee.” Not quite as culturally lofty as Samuel Becket, but certainly in closer keeping with your linguistic abilities. By the way, Becket’s premier work focused on the absurdity of human existence, so unless you want to be dismissed as a useless and idiotic dreamer, I’d refrain from identifying with him so publicly in the future.
I’m saying that there is no point in griping about things you can’t do anything about. City gets hot, need air conditioners. City gets cold, need heaters. Living in city gets too expensive, young families have to move farther out, need cars, and cars need roads and pollute in the bargain. All of it detracts from the pastoral idyll you seem to think is achievable in an urban megalopolis. It’s like listening to environmentalists bewailing the consumption of earthly resources but at the same time calling governments racist if they curtail immigration. Sure, they want the people here, so they can tell the mirror how tolerant they are. They just don’t want them to live anywhere, eat anything, or own stuff.
Ed wrote: “And we should all just shut up and subscribe to your despair?”
You should shut up and implement simple, common-sense solutions to your problems instead of waiting for karma to do it for you. Nuff said.
Posted by on {comment_date format=’%m/%d’} at {comment_date format=’%h:%i %A’}
Posted by on 08/19 at 08:32 PM
The story so far: a person posts a short anecdote, a wistful sketch of recent memories of hot summer nights, the sound of trains and air conditioners; another person comments in similar and empathetic response; a third person comments in a similar way but from the point of view of much more distant memories and amplifies by recalling related work done by a major Canadian artist. Time passes and yet another commenter posts in a, to me, dismissive and condescending fashion to the effect that we should just get over it.
I believe that the author of the third comment did in fact offer concrete suggestions; he now draws some lines between the dots:
If you are rusty on or don’t know who R Murray Schafer is and/or what his notions of the Soundscape entail, please follow this link, the results of a Google search on the words “schafer” and “soundscape”:
Please read, for example, the two entries on the first page citing Wikipedia articles on R Murray Schafer and Soundscape; read further. Note the titles of some of the books that he has written, particularly on the soundscape and ear cleaning. You will probably discover that the impetous for Soundscape seems to have petered out, splintered, perhaps disappeared in some respects, certainly become diffuse. Perhaps this is in the nature of ideas. In fact, digging further into the Google results, you’ll find that there are entries relating to activities taking place this very summer that are motivated, at least in part, by Soundscape. R Murray Schafer, though in his 70s, is still very active as a composer and polemicist.
If you get to this point and anything at all you’ve encountered along the way peaks your curiosity, and more importantly encourages you, then please follow this link
to the rather small, 5 item collection that comes up at the Toronto Public Library web site when queried with “Schafer” and “Soundscpe”. Small, dated. Hopefully incomplete because of the ineptitude of the query. Still there is a beginning. Which is what is to be hoped for. Library cards as you know are free.
I think it is unfortunate (and one definition of despair) that we can come to believe there are things—other than our ultimate personal demise—that we “can’t do anything about.” I believe that “doing something about it” is at the heart of being a human being. Using words to do things (in contrast to the rather infantile way we’ve been using them here) is one of the most powerful ways we have of being human, of getting things done.
Shane, I apologize for apparently offending your sense of self, your maturity and your apparently very strongly entrenched sense of reality. And I wish whole heartedly that you introduce yourself to Murray Schafer’s work, both musical and verbal; I can’t imagine that it won’t make some sort of difference, both for you and maybe for others in the process. I hope so.
Ed, I suspect we’re dealing with a troll here. The last comment, which ended up in my mailbox (although apparently not here on Reading Toronto) included a string of incoherent text followed by a threat of violence.
I’ve enjoyed your comments, and although I’m not familiar with the work of R. Murray Schafer, can certainly see the connections you make. Of course, a peaceful city (or soundscape) isn’t necessarily a silent one. There is a place even for dischordant sounds, like those of the trains at night, or horses at gallop, or a shout or laugh, or the smack of a gunshot. They help us create an aural map of our surroundings. In contrast, certain other mechanical sounds—like the ceaseless whine of cars on a freeway, or hours of jackhammering a block away, or the drone of an air conditioning unit loud in your ear—both dull and irritate the senses. We lose track of the movement and flow of entities around us, and it frightens something deep in our primordial brains, attuned to listening into the atmostphere.
As I write this, it’s another cool night, the leaves stirred by a low wind, the crickets chirping. I can hear somebody wheeling a bike in the laneway, and kids going inside just up the street. There’s a dog barking somewhere, a car roaring heavily along Dundas, an airplane crossing the night sky, and—just now—the snuffling of raccoons climbing down into the back garden. I can hear all these sounds because it’s a cool night, and because the air conditioners on the street are turned off.
Thank you, Amy. I confess I’m a bit out of touch with Murrray Schafer’s music and ideas since leaving the music business in 1981. However, your post brought back memories and motivated a reconnection. I’ve also become curious to see whether there are parallels to be drawn between his Soundscape and what I’m notionally calling the Viewscape. So I eagerly await the arrival of “The Tuning of the World” from my local (online) bookseller.
Following my own advice, reading into what’s available online, he has developed some useful concepts for organizing thinking about the acoustical environment: notably, keynote sounds, sound signals, and (as you mention) sound marks.
It will be fun to get reacquainted with these old/new ideas. Perhaps, given the knowledge of an appreciative reader or two, I’ll try to put my impressions together in a post.
Thanks again (and watch out for those racoons; they’re the devil in the lead up to collection day as you probably know.)
There are bad air conditioners that make too much noise and should be dealt with, but on hot nights walking through the city i like the low hum they give off, especially walking by apartment buildings that don’t have a central unit, and have apt units instead. Like a white noise sympony. When i was a kid my window was by our air conditioner in windsor, and i’d go put the thermostat lower (secretly, cuz dad, not exactly an environmentalist but a fan of low power bills, kept it “too high”) so i could fall asleep listening to the outdoor fan and compressor hum on.
I just got back from California and had a few periods of absolute silence, mostly on top of a desert mountain. On friday i went up a trail 2 hrs north of San Franciso—all i could hear was my feet crunching on shale, a few horrible insects buzzing around my ears at times and the blood pumping through my ears (it was a 45 degree hike in super-heat). It was nice, but made me paranoid, like some terrible thing was hiding in the bushes. I whistled to make up for it, but the sound just dissapear into the air—no match for the weight of the silence.
Back in the city, with the low hum all around late last night, was very safe feeling. Nothing hiding in bushes but perverts and racoons and Lennox’s.
