The Citizen as a Key Point of the Policies: A First Approach to Auralization for the Acoustic Perception of Noise in an Urban Environment

Abstract

The improvement of the quality of life in the framework of the smart city paradigm cannot be limited to a set of objective measures carried out over several critical parameters (e.g., noise, air pollution). The citizen’s perception of the problem to be solved, as well as the perception of the improvement achieved with the policies defined for this purpose are more important than the objectivity and the measurement of the change achieved. A first auralization approach for the evaluation of the acoustic perception of street noise is presented in this work. The wireless acoustic sensor network can pick up street noise and can even record specific sounds that reach a higher equivalent level for study, but the most important thing for administration is whether the neighbor has noticed an improvement in the quality of life. This work is a first approximation to an estimation of the real perception of citizens of the street urban noises collected by a low-cost wireless acoustic sensor network.

Keywords

• noise
• auralization
• citizen
• smart city
• wireless acoustic sensor network