When Flora Blathwayt, 36, started her community beach cleans in Battersea, Southbank and Greenwich two years ago, she introduced a five-minute sound meditation at the start of each session to help her attendees unwind. The quiet banks of the Thames felt like an escape from the madness of the city; a quiet, traffic-free oasis where frazzled Londoners could come, breathe and listen to the waves, the seabirds and the crunch of the pebbles under their feet.
Some 24 months on and that sense of peace is proving increasingly difficult to find. “London definitely feels a lot louder now,” says Blathwayt, the founder of Washed Up Cards who runs wellbeing-focused beach cleans and creative workshops for the public and staff from companies including Depop and Hachette Books.
“People want time-out from busy London and our beach cleans are still a lovely antidote to that, but these days they definitely feel a little more diluted by the chaos. It just feels like there’s more of everything now: more sirens, more traffic, more shouting, more building work... Sometimes, it can put you in quite a stressful place.”
Blathwayt and her gang of monthly beach-cleaners might be acutely conscious of our capital’s rapidly reducing quiet spaces, but they are far from only Londoners feeling the effects of life in a city that is increasingly on full volume. Aside from a (brief) lockdown-imposed noise hiatus in 2020, our capital city has been getting distinctly louder year-on-year; in some cases deafeningly so — and it’s wreaking havoc with our health.
Last month, a new study from the UK Health Security Agency warned that chronic noise pollution — particularly that caused by road traffic — is shaving years off our lives, with the World Health Organisation (WHO) warning that noise is the second-most harmful environmental factor affecting human health after bad air-quality and that at least one million healthy life-years are lost every year in western Europe due to environmental noise and its negative impact on sleep, stress, depression, anxiety and heart disease. Children were found to be particularly badly affected, with traffic noise found to slow children’s memory development by 23 per cent.
“This is not scaremongering,” says Queen Mary University professor Stephen Stansfield, one of the world’s leading noise experts who advised WHO on its research. “Our brains are programmed to respond to noises. In evolutionary terms, noises were potentially a source of danger. Over a long period, if you are stressed, that can put up your blood pressure and increase your risk of heart attacks.”
Unsurprisingly, built-up areas were found to be the noisiest in WHO’s study, but London in particular was singled-out in terms of the number of years lost from road-traffic and aircraft noise — and not just for those living near to the capital’s busiest roads and flightpaths. Sirens, engines, drilling and the screech and rattle of the Tube are among the increasingly common manmade noises adding to the soundtrack that is life in our capital, with a study last year finding parts of Soho, Covent Garden and Westminster to have noise levels of at least 70cB — the same level as a washing machine.
The battle for quiet is even harder, if not impossible, down on London’s Underground (thunderground?) network. Independent research into in-carriage Tube noise found that passengers routinely experienced noise levels of over 80 dBA — classed as “hazardous” by TfL — and were sometimes subjected to levels over 100 dBA, which London Assembly Member Zack Polanski has said is comparable to “chain saws, rivet hammers and even an aircraft taking off”. TfL says noise complaints on the Underground are up year-on-year, with the Northern and Victoria lines reported to be the loudest.
“My Apple Watch tells me the sound level is too high every time I reach Finchley Road on the Jubilee Line, I have a baby son under one year old so it definitely makes me think twice when travelling,” says Andrew Jude, 35, a media lead from north-west London.
You can’t hear a podcast or a voice-note over the Tube these days... it’s no wonder we Londoners are stressed all the time
“I don’t know if the post-Covid era has made me more impatient but London makes me feel almost-permanently angry now,” says Katie Jones, 29, a comms consultant from Tooting who takes the Northern Line to work four days a week. “Spending 60 minutes a day with the equivalent of someone yelling into my ear makes me want to scream... You can’t hear a podcast or a voice-note over the Tube these days, barely music, and it’s not much better if I cycle with all the sirens and mopeds — it’s no wonder we Londoners are stressed all the time.”
Indeed it isn’t. Research shows that people living near to busy roads are more likely to develop high cortisol levels, to suffer from hypertension and heart disease and to become overweight, while a study by non-profit eco organisation Bruitparif concluded that a person living in the loudest areas of region surrounding Paris loses “more than three healthy life-years” because of noise.
Experts say the fact that many of us have got used to the thrum of cities is one of the most worrying parts of the current noise epidemic. “You may become psychologically adapted to it and stop noticing it, but physiologically it is still having an effect on your pulse, your heart rate, your blood pressure,” says Stansfield.
For those with hearing loss already, the incessant scream of London’s noise ghettos can feel particularly intolerable. “It’s shocking... there are laws on noise pollution outside of train stations or building works but none for noise levels inside Tube and train carriages,” says Samantha Baines, an author and actress from south London who says noise pollution is a “nightmare” as a deaf person who relies on lipreading and a hearing aid.
It’s not just the Tube adding to London’s growing sense of sonic doom. “It’s like London is the capital for impatient people and bad drivers. I think it symbolises a bigger issue with modern-day life and impatience and instant gratification,” says Claudia Green*, 25, a videographer from Brixton who believes noise is a reflection of everything that’s wrong with our city: growing stress levels, a mental health crisis, increased isolation and large swathes decamping to the countryside.
Marcio Delgado, 43, a digital consultant from Walthamstow, agrees. “I go to New York three times a year for work and I used to be shocked by the abysmal difference in noise levels when compared to London. Not anymore,” he says. “London is turning into New York: you can’t talk on the phone or leave windows open because of the ambulances and police sirens and constant noise. It’s like a bad soundtrack and it’s getting louder.”
So what’s the solution — do city-dwellers not have a right to peace and quiet? Does progress simply mean a noisier world or are there lessons to be learnt from Covid’s enforced peace? And if noise pollution really is the next big public health crisis, why isn’t it being prioritised in the same way as reducing air pollution or curing cancer?
“It’s a bit like smoking: everyone knows how bad it is for you nowadays. In the future we’ll hopefully be like that [with noise] and realise ‘that was not a very healthy period’,” says Dr Finnur Pind, acoustics engineer and co-founder of Treble, an Icelandic company that develops sound-simulation technology.
Pind has spent years looking into the psychological and physical effects of noise pollution and says the lack of awareness around noise pollution is largely down to its invisibility. “It’s not directly in your face... but it’s still looming and creeping and affecting your health,” he explains. “When you go out of the city your shoulders come down and you’re like ‘Ah’. What’s the difference? It’s the noise level. We’re not really built for that. Almost every person you meet who lives in a city is affected, to some extent. You just don’t always see it directly.”
Like smoking, Pind fears that the extent to which noise pollution is affecting our health will only be realised too late and that it’s unlikely to improve anytime soon, given how much of it is woven into the fabric of our city from the trains that take us to work to the Deliveroo riders delivering our dinners. Yes, we can take individual measures like wearing noise-muffling earplugs like Loop or noise-cancelling headphones, but these merely replace urban noise pollution with more sound, which not only add to that feeling of being constantly “on” and flood our brains with more content, but can in extreme cases lead to hearing loss.
More depressingly, short-term measures like wearing headphones only work for those of us lucky enough to have to put up with the dreadful screeching of the Tube for a small section of our day. What about the people — often those from disproportionately poorer communities — who live above the tracks and for whom that noise is quite literally woven into the foundation of their homes?
Lib Dem London Assembly member and Deputy Chair of the Transport Committee Caroline Pidgeon says she’s met many of these families over recent years. She’s stood in their living rooms and felt the vibrations when a train roars underneath their feet, and seen the life-changing effects this can have as they struggle to sleep or are forced to move out of the capital altogether. “It’s taking its toll on [most of us]. But for some people it can shape and take over their whole life,” she says.
Noise might not be directly in your face... but it’s still looming and creeping and affecting your health. We're not built for that
Neil Smith, a Tube noise campaigner who lives near the Victoria line in Islington, says he knows residents who have to put up with 72 trains rattling under their homes every hour, with some registering close to 60 decibels, “equivalent to a vacuum cleaner in the room with you”.
It’s for these people in particular that figures like Pidgeon and Pind believe wider, more drastic measures are needed to truly tackle the problem, like rethinking building and transport design to prioritise noise reduction, taxing short-haul flights and subsidising electric vehicles, or following the lead of other cities’ noise reduction schemes. Glasgow recently introduced new ‘quiet zones’ to protect peaceful spaces, Paris has installed noise cameras to monitor vehicles’ sound levels and Switzerland has introduced national quiet hours.
Wales recently became the first UK country to create a national soundscapes strategy, which puts onus on the government to not only eliminate unwanted noise but protect sounds like birdsong and the vibrant hum of town centres. Surely London, one of the loudest cities in the world, can and should be following suit, they suggest. Pidgeon is currently recommending to TfL that it hosts an international innovation competition to help reduce noise in London, bringing together the private sector, the Mayor’s Office and universities and research institutes across the world.
Mayor of London Sadiq Khan says alleviating Tube noise “remains a top priority” for his team, with TfL reportedly undertaking 17,500 metres of noise-related rail grinding in the last six months and trialling new track-fastenings that reduce the noise and vibrations of the track (they’re currently in use on the Jubilee Line between Baker Street and St John’s Wood if you want to hear them for yourself).
Up on the streets, meanwhile, some measures are gently beginning to be taken by local authorities. Westminster Council is supposedly cracking down on rickshaws playing loud music, fining them for antisocial behaviour. Kensington and Chelsea installed a whole load of loud exhaust ‘noise cameras’ to clamp down on supercars and boy racers last year. And noise pollution is still cited as a major reason campaigners are opposing Heathrow’s third runway, as it would leave 1.6m people at risk of up to 47 noisy flights an hour.
The House of Lords science and tech committee recently launched an inquiry into the impacts of noise and light pollution on human health, but increasing numbers of Londoners say they’re not prepared to wait and are taking the effects of this not-so-silent killer into their own hands. “I live next to one of the busiest roads in London and a hospital so opening the window in the summer is a nightmare for sleeping,” says Suswati Basu, 35, an editor and podcast host who is planning to leave Tooting for the leafy Berkshire town of Bracknell for noise reasons. “The nearest hospital is four minutes away and the noise of sirens is beyond belief, I’ve had enough.”
Basu is not the only one realising the impact of noise on not only wellbeing but creativity. “It’s made such a difference to my overall wellbeing and creativity... All my projects are now focused on getting away from the noise,” says Ellie Turner-Coughlin, 32, a founder and TEDx speaker who moved from Colliers Wood to Surrey three months ago. “Taking myself out of that space has been great... I feel so much more creative now,” says freelance writer Shafi Musaddique, 32, who threw in the towel and swapped Camden for Estonia’s capital city Tallinn in February after three decades spent living in the capital.
Among those who have to stay in London for work, social or housing reasons, many are coming up with creative ways to turn their internal or external volume down. “I’ve started having to listen to Pachelbel’s Canon on the Tube just to get home without having a nervous breakdown,” says Jones. “When noise is overwhelming during my day I try to focus on the noise, switching my focus from trying to block it out to focusing on which parts of my body are tensing up and what’s happening to my thoughts,” says Judy Claughton, a meditation teacher who comes into London on the Elisabeth Line from her home in Reading.
Life strategist and author Hyacinth Myers says he even went as far as taking a Raja Yoga Meditation course, teaching himself to meditate with his eyes open. “It took me a while to learn to switch off, but I can meditate everywhere, even on the Tube now,” he says.
It’s a bit like smoking: everyone knows how bad it is for you nowadays. In the future we’ll hopefully be like that with noise
Myers is one of many Londoners to admit he spends more time indoors now due to the noise — hardly a healthy lifestyle choice. “Noise heightens my ADHD and migraines so I prefer to stay indoors these days despite being a socialite,” says west Londoner Sonya Barlow, 30, CEO of careers and inclusion platform LMF Network.
Others say they’re spending more on noise-reduction investments like electric cars, triple-paned windows and weekend trips out of London — luxuries that will only widen the noise inequality gap between rich and poor. In a world increasingly on full volume, quiet seems to have become just another a consumable product — and an increasingly exclusive one.
Claughton recommends daily meditation or white noise apps, time in nature, prioritising sleep and focusing on your breath and sounds like birdsong when walking or running as low-cost, micro-level ways to reduce the negative health effects of noise pollution. While Blathwayt’s public beach clean and sound meditation sessions are free and perfect for Londoners who can’t afford more exclusive forms of escapism.
She also developed her own list of personal quiet zones, for when the sound of the city all gets too much: Nunhead cemetery, Hampstead Ponds, Brockwell Lido in the winter and a secret spot on the Thames near to her home in south-east London. “I still absolutely love the River Thames and it will always be my oasis,” she says. “It’s just a shame it has to be a bit of a noisier one now.”
