America's national parks provide a wealth of experiences to
millions of people every year. What visitors see-landscapes,
wildlife, cultural activities-often lingers in memory for life. And
what they hear adds a dimension that sight alone cannot provide.
Natural sounds can dramatically enhance visitors' experience of
many aspects of park environments. In some settings, such as the
expanses of Yellowstone National Park, they can even be the best
way to enjoy wildlife, because animals can be heard at much greater
distances than they can be seen. Sounds can also be a natural
complement to natural scenes, whether the rush of water over a
rocky streambed or a ranger's explanation of a park's history. In
other settings, such as the New Orleans Jazz National Historical
Park, sounds are the main reason for visiting a park. The
acoustical environment is also important to the well-being of the
parks themselves. Many species of wildlife depend on their hearing
to find prey or avoid predators. If they cannot hear, their
survival is jeopardized-and the parks where they live may in turn
lose part of their natural heritage. For all these reasons it is
important to be aware of noise (defined as unwanted sound, and in
this case usually generated by humans or machinery), which can
degrade the acoustical environment, or soundscape, of parks. Just
as smog smudges the visual horizon, noise obscures the listening
horizon for both visitors and wildlife. This is especially true in
places, such as remote wilderness areas, where extremely low sound
levels are common. The National Park Service (NPS) has determined
that park facilities, operations, and maintenance activities
produce a substantial portion of noise in national parks and thus
recognizes the need to provide park managers with guidance for
protecting the natural soundscape from such noise. Therefore, the
focus of the workshop was to define what park managers can do to
control noise from facilities, operations, and maintenance, and not
on issues such as the effects of noise on wildlife, noise metrics,
and related topics. To aid in this effort, NPS joined with the
National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and with the US Department of
Transportation's John A. Volpe National Transportation Systems
Center to hold a workshop to examine the challenges and
opportunities facing the nation's array of parks. Entitled
"Protecting National Park Soundscapes: Best Available Technologies
and Practices for Reducing Park- Generated Noise," the workshop
took place October 3-4, 2012, at NPS's Natural Resource Program
Center in Fort Collins, Colorado. Protecting National Park
Soundscapes is a summary of the workshop. Table of Contents Front
Matter 1 Introduction and Themes of the Workshop 2 Noise in the
National Parks 3 Report from the Transportation Breakout Group 4
Report from the Facilities and Maintenance Breakout Group 5 Report
from the Construction Breakout Group 6 Reflections on the Workshop
References Appendix A: Workshop Steering Committee Biographical
Information Appendix B: Workshop Agenda Appendix C: Workshop
Attendees
General
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