Ulhasnagar noisiest city in state; Dhule, Parbhani quietest

Mumbai:

A state-wide study conducted by the National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (NEERI) has revealed that Ulhasnagar is the noisiest city in the state.

The city has recorded highest decibels during the day as well as during the night. It is also the noisiest irrespective of it being a working or nonworking day.

NEERI recorded the highest average noise level of 91.4 decibel (db) in Ulhasnagar. At night, the city recorded slightly higher noise on a non-working day (86.7 db) than on a working day (85.1 db).

Maharashtra Pollution Control Board’s (MPCB) advocate, Sadhana Mahashabde, on Tuesday submitted the NEERI report to the Bombay high court (HC) bench of justice Abhay Oka and justice Riyaz Chagla. It revealed that with average noise level of 72.8 db, Dhule is the quietest among all the areas under the 27 municipal corporations during a working day, whereas Parbhani is the quietest at night on working (63.5 db) as well as non-working (65 db) days.

The report further revealed

that Nagpur, Chandrapur, Dhule and Parbhani were the quietest cities in Maharashtra, maintaining lesser decibel levels on working days than noise levels persisting on non-working days in most of the other cities in the state.

NEERI has primarily blamed vehicular sound – honking and also the road traffic clatter, as the main source of noise in urban areas of Maharashtra and it has suggested a number of measures ranging from creating awareness, training drivers to imposing penalty on errant motorists to curb unnecessary honking and vehicular noise.