Airplane noise concerns overblown?

[Anonymous]

Sorry to ask, but can someone other than the clearly very-bothered individual who makes all of the airplane noise posts on this forum please chip in their perspectives on airplane noise in the Cabin John, Potomac, Glen Echo, Palisades neighborhoods? I was over there today and it didn't seem that bad.

[Anonymous]

Nice try at stonewalling. The pollution you can’t even hear. But you’d have to be deliberately ignoring hearing and seeing the planes.

Let’s just check what the actual people living there were saying this week on the local listserve, each a different “individual” btw:

planes zoomed directly overhead

Keep complaining Palisades!!

frequency and noise of the aircraft has definitely increased and has adversely impacted so many of our residents

appreciation to Palisades residents for your perseverance on reporting noise instances

long-term problem for Palisades residents

[Anonymous]

Here’s another recent from a different resident

The airline noise tonight is unbearable. Starting around 9pm and continuing, the planes are directly over our home on xxxxx and nowhere close to the river.

There were lawsuits, twitter accounts, citizen groups etc — why if it’s a lone hyper-sensitive crazy resident who single-handedly filed all the complaints?

It sucks is the truth. You can have better or worse hearing but the pollution is the same and detrimental to your health

A small victory was won this week, stop undermining the effort by pretending it’s an overhyped issue. It will take about a year to see if it even helps so can’t stop the momentum now

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sorry to ask, but can someone other than the clearly very-bothered individual who makes all of the airplane noise posts on this forum please chip in their perspectives on airplane noise in the Cabin John, Potomac, Glen Echo, Palisades neighborhoods? I was over there today and it didn't seem that bad.

Why you up? Is it also b/c the planes?

[Anonymous]

OP, here is an objective account directly answering your question. Some of these people have moved since.

https://wamu.org/story/16/10/26/jet_noise_is_no_joke_for_residents_burned_by_report_on_airport_complaints/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sorry to ask, but can someone other than the clearly very-bothered individual who makes all of the airplane noise posts on this forum please chip in their perspectives on airplane noise in the Cabin John, Potomac, Glen Echo, Palisades neighborhoods? I was over there today and it didn't seem that bad.

Where were you exactly? That’s quite a broad geography.

Or maybe you were too busy prepping the open house to notice?

[Anonymous]

It depends on which way the planes are flying. In our neighborhood, the south flow approach generates a lot of noise while the north flow departure generates less noise here. For us, the noise is bothersome and annoying at times, but we live in a relatively new build home with good insulation and very high end windows, which attenuates the noise quite a bit, but not completely. (I just heard an approach while having a quiet coffee in my living room, which was mildly annoying, for example.). It mostly hampers our ability to enjoy our outdoor spaces, but we do have to use white noise machines while sleeping because the occasional post-midnight arrival will wake you up if you don’t have something to cover it. If you live in an older home with minimal sound attenuation, it would be terrible, IMO.

They are supposedly making adjustments to the approach procedure that should help. We will see. There is a lengthy backstory as to how we got to where we are, which only the affected people likely care about.

[Anonymous]

I think it really depends on what area you're talking about. Palisades I would imagine is louder bc the planes are lower. I live in Glen Echo and, while I hear and see planes, it does not bother me bc they just don't seem to be that loud imo. I'm also kindof an aviation geek so enjoy seeing what's flying, which direction, etc.. and I love to try to find my house if I'm on the right side of the plane taking off/landing

the coast guard helicopters flying over the river are louder, but they are less frequent, and I wouldn't trade off being further from the river.

[Anonymous]

A small victory was won this week, stop undermining the effort by pretending it’s an overhyped issue. It will take about a year to see if it even helps so can’t stop the momentum now


What is the small victory that was won?

[Anonymous]

We live next to Glen Echo and are sometimes in the flight path. Your brain learns to tune it out, just like it does with other background noise. I can be in the backyard and not notice it unless a friend who is visiting brings it up.

The only time it's obvious is when it's a certain level of clouds so the planes have to fly really low below them on approach, but that's not common.

I used to live in an apartment next to a bunch of bars. Every morning at 5am, trucks would come to pick up the trash cans of glass beer bottles and taht was quite a sound. I noticed it the first week I lived there, then tuned it out after a week as my brain adjusted.

Same with road noise, which you'll see at some neighborhoods in Glen Echo or nearby -- you can hear the hum of the Beltway, but only if you really listen for it or are not used to it.

The brain's an amazing thing.

[Anonymous]

So I just moved here. It’s not bad but something new to get used to. The first few mornings I noticed it. But where I lived before had lots more helicopters over our house, but that tended to be afternoon and night. Here it comes and goes based on flight path. Overall - no big deal and I’m very noise sensitive. I’d say it’s a minor downside.

[Anonymous]

I would ask Jeff to look into sock puppeting on this thread and other ones, there is clearly one person who has an axe to grind (probably lost out on buying a house in this area or is angry at someone who lives here) and frequently posts the same things. It's unhinged. I live in this area and it doesn't bother me at all. It never comes up with neighbors. It's just not an issue at all.

[Anonymous]

I live in the palisades, on the north end near Sibley Hospital. Inside my home, I can very vaguely hear some plane noise in the back in some rooms and it just blends in. There are days it’s more prevalent than others but the days it is actually bothersome are very few and far between. Our neighborhood is actually very quiet and peaceful - there’s no real traffic noise or other city sounds. I can’t speak to what it’s like closer to the Georgetown side of the Palisades but when walking around over by the farmers market or Black Coffee, I don’t really notice it. Perhaps because traffic on MacArthur masks the plane noise.

[Anonymous]

Live in Glen Echo Heights, near the river/MacArthur. It's mostly a background hum. Occasionally there is a plane with engines throttled up that is unusually loud. If you're drifting in/out of sleep at 5:58am, there is about 20 minutes of steady landing approaches. Inside, it's not much. Used to live in the city and it was consistently way noisier due to traffic, sirens, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We live next to Glen Echo and are sometimes in the flight path. Your brain learns to tune it out, just like it does with other background noise. I can be in the backyard and not notice it unless a friend who is visiting brings it up.

The only time it's obvious is when it's a certain level of clouds so the planes have to fly really low below them on approach, but that's not common.

I used to live in an apartment next to a bunch of bars. Every morning at 5am, trucks would come to pick up the trash cans of glass beer bottles and taht was quite a sound. I noticed it the first week I lived there, then tuned it out after a week as my brain adjusted.

Same with road noise, which you'll see at some neighborhoods in Glen Echo or nearby -- you can hear the hum of the Beltway, but only if you really listen for it or are not used to it.

The brain's an amazing thing.

The pollution that comes with those planes is something you can’t do anything about though, and the evidence that it’s very harmful in the long term is overwhelming. It’s stuff like heart and lung disease, dementia, asthma in children, cognitive difficulties, shortened lifespan. None of it from the noise, just the ultra fine particles released by the planes and pushed straight down at and into you on closer to departure and take off areas. The noise poses it’s own risks and they only abate with hearing loss that comes in older age because of that noise.
Shortened life span and chronic disease, no thanks.