Morning:
3°c
Deafening sound of the Underground
Miranda Bryant26.11.09
Buskers who play their music too loud are putting the hearing of commuters at risk.
Some musicians at Tube stations are exceeding 100 decibels - the same level as a plane landing at Heathrow.
The UK Noise Association said that complaints about noise were increasing with hotspots including Tottenham Court Road, Bank, Piccadilly Circus, Oxford Circus and Leicester Square.
John Stewart, a spokesman for the group, said there had been a "steady stream" of complaints: "People feel buskers should be a relaxing feature of the Underground, but now it's not. Noise that is close to 100 decibels could damage hearing quite badly."
The increase in volume has been put down to the growing number of performers using amplifiers.
Buskers defended their actions saying it was difficult to compete with background noise at busy times and with Transport for London announcements.
The loudest was guitarist Steve Emson, 44, of Wimbledon, whose harmonica and amplified guitar at Oxford Circus reached 110.9 decibels.
He said: "I don't think I play too loud. I stay at whatever is the best volume for the pitch at the time. At the moment it's very busy, you get thousands of people who come through at this time."
Drummer Jim Cartright, 36, whose playing at Piccadilly Circus reached 103 decibels, said he was careful to judge the reactions of passengers walking past.
Mr Cartright, a part-time busker and music teacher from Hackney, said: "It depends on the station and time of day. I don't do any busking at 8am for example. Sometimes my disposition is to quieten down if I see a pram or an old person." There are about 240 licensed buskers on the Tube at 21 stations. Waterloo guitarist Sharron Levy, 26, said: "It's a privilege that we get to play here so announcements have to be heard." Miss Levy, whose music peaked at 100.7 decibels, added: "I'm worried about being too loud because it's such an empty space and with people rustling their bags it's difficult to tell."
Musicians' Union official Jo Laverty said: "Great care is taken to handle noise levels and their impact on residents and premises. It's a shame when complaints from often just one member of the public can result in musicians' livelihoods being brought into question."
A TfL spokeswoman said: "We take every complaint seriously and investigate thoroughly. We work with buskers to make sure they keep to a volume at which the public address system can be heard. Complaints are extremely rare. Since July 2008, London Underground has received four from customers."
Reader views (16)
I agree with Jonathon on this one. I can handle the buskers, just about put up with the announcments, but the screeching train wheels - ouch!
- Dom, London
Love the American accented platform attendant on the northern line at Waterloo who tells everyone to have a lovely jubbly day.
- David, London
Buskers noise is not the problem..
Take a ride on the Piccadilly line from Hammersmith to Piccadilly Circus. The noise from the train lines screeching through the tunnels is deafening and im sure the dB levels are damaging... TFL should be looking at the issue of noise, as exposure to this each day will cause long term ear damage.
- Jonathon Morrison, London England
I Find the deafening and pointless announcements more annoying than the buskers. It wouldn't surprise me if they were playing loudly they've probably gone deaf after half an hour of 'there currently is a good service on all lines' or 'please be careful on slippy floors 'cos it's raining' being bellowed at them every thirty seconds by someone form LU with a speech impediment.
- David O'Connell, London
"Since July 2008, London Underground has received four from customers." Good to see these stats are not always overlooked, as they so often are.
Also buskers know that if its too loud they won't get any money so its obviously in their interests to keep it at a reasonable level!
- Chris Read, Ealing
Miranda,
Both Nigel and Steve are entirely correct - there is no chance that noise generated by buskers could ever be a risk to peoples hearing.
there are a number of things wrong with the piece, not least of which the meter used to take the measurements (Maplins - £14.99) records C-weighted sound pressure levels, a little used weighting which does not discriminate between low and high frequency noise. The human ear is relatively insensitive to low frequency noise which means that the readings presented could be as much as 20dB higher than would actually be experienced by a commuter, or the A-weighted level which is closer to the response of the ear, as would be presented in a noise report. Furthermore, the measurements are instantaneous levels (from which no useful data can be derived) and do not appear to consider the residual background noise level at the station.
- Simon, London
Mouth organ loud as jumbo jet! Hmmm
- Jpin Zscovcjly, Warsaw. Poland
I used to be a London Underground busker myself & I thought it went against my vision of busking to drag around the type of amplification you commonly see buskers using now-a-days. I never amplified my voice as I thought that way no one could ever accuse me of being too loud. I think some buskers are too loud. It's just part of busking to be occasionally drowned out by whatever noise is around you, like a market or a street or whatever. That is what I see as the organic, fluid nature of busking. & if it meant I couldn't do Piccadilly Circus 1 - well, so be it.
- Glen Mcallister, Brisbane, Australia
The station owners and the train operators are as guilty of deafening us as the buskers. The number of announcements and the volume of them on the Northern and the Piccadilly lines, for example, are unbearable and I avoid both lines if at all possible. And why must each announcement be repeated so often? Even the platforms now come complete with a microphoned announcer competeing with the trains to out noise each other. The most patronising and offensive of all the new announcements is the one telling us that 'good service' is operating on whichever lines are left after they have announced all of the the line and station closures. The word 'good' is itself a value judgement and, since TfL seem to think that talking at us for the entire duration of our journey is a good thing, I do not consider the service on the London Transport to be good at all. "All other lines are running to timetable' would, at least, be less galling to have to listen to each day and night. I would rather they all shut up though.
- William Davy, London
Miranda, did you really do the measurements yourself with that £19.99 Maplin meter, as the picture caption implies? If so, they don't mean that much. The Maplin meter (according to Maplin) only measures C weighted, which is fairly meaningless for judging either annoyance or possible hearing damage. Everyone else does this with A weighted measurements. C weighting could give a reading that is far too high if there is much bass. Measuring sound is not that simple - you can get very different readings depending on where you measure and how you set the meter - so next time please use an expert!
- Tony Woolf, London UK
The readings on those Maplin devices are meaningless. 110 db within 2 or 3 feet of a sound source which, itself, is angled towards the wall, bears no relation to what the public are hearing.
If you held a sound meter to the mouth of someone singing unplugged you would get a reading of 100 plus. It also tales no account of the considerable amount of ambient noise which would have had an effect on the reading.
- Steve Emson, Wimbledon. UK
Pardon?
- Nobby Clark, Perth, the Scottish one
I travel on the Nothern Line most days and many of the announcements (need least from drivers) are defeaning; at least I can walk away from buskers.
- Alan, London
I agree with Nigel. I think by far the biggest danger from loud music on the tube involves those dear passengers who have their MP3 players turned up to the max so we all get to hear it ... though whether the main danger is from them going deaf or from the severe brusing they'll suffer when one of their fellow passengers finally snaps is probably the big question.
- Paul, London
Has anyone measured the noise of the trains? I'd put money on them being a good deal louder than the buskers.
- Johnb, Biggleswade
Brief exposure to sound at 100dB or even 110dB won't harm your hearing. It's being exposed to it for hours that is dangerous. Since people don't wait in the corridors and you don't get buskers on the platforms, the only person at risk is the busker himself.
That said ... to any buskers reading this, if it's painfully noisy, I'm not going to pause to listen and I'm not going to give you any money. So turn it down!
- Nigel, London
