Environmental Circumstances and Access to Quietness: Two City Districts

quietness is expressed, is related to whether or not it fits a person’s personal preference and needs. However, those personal preferences are easier to realise if that person has the means and opportunities to do so, which can be aided or restricted by the external circumstances they find themselves in. In this section, public and private environmental circumstances in both city districts are discussed in relation to access to quietness. Different levels of control over the acoustic environment mediated by these environmental factors are shown to be important in the overall evaluation of sound and consequently, the need for quietness.

Centrum district

An important environmental factor to discuss is the perceived loudness and noisiness of the public acoustic environment that might increase the need for quietness. As mentioned before, especially residents of Amsterdam Centrum ascribe the various nuisances in their direct living environments to tourists and hospitality establishments. Although many of these participants do enjoy living in Centrum, due to its central location, liveliness, diversity of people, and access to the many amenities in the vicinity, nuisances were frequently emphasised. One of these

43

nuisances is noise disturbance, which is experienced mostly at night, when crowds of partygoers and tourists are said to roam the streets. Places in the city centre such as Leidseplein, Nieuwmarkt or Waterlooplein, where some participants in this study live, are some of the epicentres of tourism and nightlife in Amsterdam. Many of the participants that lived there mentioned hearing drunk people screaming, yelling, laughing, or fighting at night, the breaking of glass or police sirens when thing got out of hand. These situations recurred almost every weekend, before the covid-19 pandemic that is. These nightly escapades often caused polluted streets, resulting in loud municipal cleaning wagons and refuse lorries driving through the city streets in the early hours of the morning. And for some, the experience of structural noise does not stop there. Especially those participants that lived near or next to restaurants or offices, noted the growing amount of extraction fans and ventilation machineries that give off a mechanic, humming, or vibrating sound. Multiple participants experienced annoyance or even physical stress reactions to this constant noise and expressed the scarcity of ‘real’ quietness in the city centre. For many of these Centrum residents, the need for quietness was met by going to quiet, natural areas, by going on holiday or staying at family or friends outside the city. Many stated that the present urban green spaces within the Centrum district were not able to offer that same quietness, and so it was often sought further away.

Nevertheless, many participants from the Centrum district described their homes as quiet or tranquil, or at least as relatively quiet or quiet enough. However, this quietness was often described as something exceptional and rare, a major contrast to the usual noisiness of the streets, or as something new and temporary, due to the Covid-19 pandemic and its consequential restrictions on public life. For example, Renske (62) who has lived on the usually busy, touristy Zeedijk in Amsterdam Centrum’s China Town since the 1980’s, described the new quietness of her home: “it is really quiet now, sometimes I feel like I live in a forest, which is completely abnormal of course”. Although almost all participants described their homes as relatively quiet, many of them did seek some quietness outside their homes, often in other city districts or outside the city, indicating their homes and/or city district does not provide sufficient quietness for their needs to be met.

Nieuw West district

In the Nieuw-West district, in contrast, the types of sounds that cause nuisance are much different from those in Centrum. A striking difference between these city districts is the prevalence of mechanic sounds in Nieuw West, mainly coming from both road and air traffic.

Due to the spatial make up and geographical location of this district, many people live on or

44

nearby busy roads and under the fly-over routes of airplanes heading to or coming from Amsterdam Schiphol Airport. Another sound source that was frequently mentioned in the context of nuisance was loitering youths with loud music, loud voices and moped engines, particularly late in the evenings or at night. More than just a sonic issue, these loitering youths also reduced people’s sense of safety by giving off a threatening atmosphere of hostility.

Overall, these youths were regarded as a disturbance and related to antisocial behaviour, criminality and pollution. However, the expressed need for quietness seemed much lower in Amsterdam Nieuw West as many participants described their neighbourhood as relatively quiet, especially in comparison to Centrum district, which they envisioned as busier, more chaotic, and noisy. This was in part due to the residential character of the area and the vicinity of many parks and recreational green spaces, such as Sloterplas.

The experience of quietness at home was often ascribed to the relative quietness of their neighbourhood, or the well isolated windows or walls that keep out most of the outside noise.

Unfortunately, not everyone enjoyed the same levels of acoustic control and some participants did experience a lack of quietness at home. For Claas (72), urban sound, noise and a need for quietness are a daily struggle, due to high noise annoyance from traffic sound and motorcycles in particular. Claas lives in Osdorp, on the 20^th floor of a high-rise building looking out over the Sloterplas, but along a busy road. Contrary to his expectations, sounds from the street below travel up the walls of the building and enter his home, even when he keeps windows and doors shut. The intrusive nature of the sound and his lack of ability to do anything about it, installed in him a sense of hopeless in terms of a solution. The lack of control over the acoustic environment at home and consequently the lack of ability to undertake one of his favourite activities, such as playing classical music, suggests a reduced sense of ‘feeling at home’

(Duyvendak, 2011, p. 38). Most other participants did experience relative quietness at home, or were able to experience it in the vicinity of their homes, such as in one of the parks of the Nieuw West district.

What is especially important regarding the need for quietness in both districts is not just what happens on the streets at night, but how much of that is audible inside peoples’ homes, and most importantly, in peoples bedrooms. Much of this depends on the quality of their homes and sound isolation, such as double-glazed windows or sound-proofed walls and floors. Unfortunately, good isolation was often lacking for many participants in Amsterdam Centrum, as many of them live in old or monumental buildings that are not easily adapted due to building and alteration restrictions. Homes of a more recent build (after 1980s), often did have double-glazed

45

window, which clearly minimised the disturbance of outside noise. The same goes for Amsterdam Nieuw West, and although there are hardly any monumental buildings there, the isolation quality of some homes was lacking, especially if they originated from the early Post-War era of approximately 1945 to the 1970s. One experience regarding the importance of sound proofing comes from Johan (66) who once lived in a 1950s apartment next to the A10 highway:

“my wife kept spending more time in the kitchen on the other side of the house so I’d ask her

‘why are you constantly sitting in the kitchen?’ And she’d say ‘oh that highway is driving me mad’. Well I can warn you, never go live there, it was really badly isolated, all homes from the 50s, no double glazing or any quality isolation, it was bad”. Consequently, this lack of sound proofing eventually led Johan and his wife to search for a new home. In both districts, a lack of proper isolation also meant participants regularly heard their neighbours, although annoying at times, they were considered relatively acceptable and sometimes even experienced as pleasurable, as will be discussed in chapter 6.3.