PROCEEDINGS of the
23rd International Congress on Acoustics
9 to 13 September 2019 in Aachen, Germany

Problems of road traffic noise annoyance and sleep disturbance insome Slovakian cities
Ladislav Mihalcik 1, Stanislav Sekretar 2, Diana Vondrova2, Jana Jurkovicova 2 , Jan Simonovic3 andLubica Argalasova 2
1

Institute of Health Disciplines, St. Elizabeth University of Health and Social Sciences, Bratislava,
Slovakia
2

Comenius University in Bratislava, Institute of Hygiene, Bratislava, Slovakia
3

SKY-ECO, s.r.o., Bratislava, Slovakia

ABSTRACTThe paper presents the results of a pilot cross-sectional study focused on subjective traffic noise annoyanceand sleep disturbance among the residents living close to major inner city corridors in several Slovakian
towns including the capital Bratislava and Kosice. The subjective adaptation to traffic noise, subjective
evaluation of health status and well-being were assessed as well.
The questionnaire survey was distributed to the pilot sample of 543 respondents (average age 45.3 ± 4.5 years,
73.1% of respondents in the age from 35 to 65 years, 26.9% in the age up to 35 years, 53% females, 81%
living in houses more than five years). The inhabitants with bedroom windows facing noisy streets or quite
streets represented the exposed and the control group. Road traffic noise annoys significantly more daily andnight activities of respondents in the exposed group who are unable to adapt to it neither by day nor by night(OR=2.66; 95 % CI=1.64−4.31 for falling asleep disturbance).
The questionnaire was supplemented by traffic noise-measurements in Bratislava, Martin, Trenčín, Piešťany
on noisy facades 50 meters (LAeq,day = from 57 dB to 72.4 dB, LAeq,night= from 52.5 dB to 61.9 dB) and morethan 100 meters from noisy traffic communication or inner city corridor.
After completion of the results, we plan to propose interim measures to noisy facades of the apartmentbuildings as well as intervention procedures in the prevention of adverse effects of traffic noise on health.
Keywords: Road traffic noise, annoyance, sleep disturbance

1. INTRODUCTION
Traffic noise is harmful to the health of almost every third person in the WHO European Region.
One in five Europeans is regularly exposed to sound levels at night that could significantly damage
health [1].
According to the results of the LARES study in panel block buildings in three cities of Eastern
Europe sponsored by WHO, noise represents a traditional urban problem and noise annoyance andsleep disturbance were recognized as the most prevalent problems affecting residential health andwell-being [2].
Health effects were identified also for selected physical and stress-related symptoms, such as
hypertension and migraine, which showed significantly increased relative risks. The results also
indicated that particular attention must be paid to night time noise exposure in homes [2, 3]. According
to WHO and environmental burden of disease (EBD) approach, traffic noise exposure features cause3565

an annual loss of 31 Disability-Adjusted Life Years per 100 000 population in the WHO European
Region [1].
The review of Basner et al., 2018 demonstrated effects of traffic noise on objectively measured
sleep physiology and on subjectively assessed sleep disturbance (including sleep quality, problems
falling asleep, and awakenings during the night) and the link between acute noise-induced sleep [3].
The paper presents the results of a pilot cross-sectional study focused on subjective traffic noise
annoyance and sleep disturbance among the residents living close to major inner city corridors in somelarger Slovakian towns including the capital Bratislava (more then 250 000 inhabitants) and Kosice(more than 100 000 inhabitants). The subjective adaptation to traffic noise, subjective evaluation ofhealth status and well-being were assessed as well.

2. MATERIAL AND METHODS
Objective measurements of noise in the external facades of selected residential buildings were
performed as a continuous 24 hour measurement of equivalent levels L Aeq,OUT of traffic noise at agiven day of working week [4,5].
Noise annoyance was subjectively assessed using a a modified standardized Noise annoyancequestionnaire [6,7]. Information from the 543 respondents (average age 45.3 ± 4.5 years, 73.1% of
respondents in the age from 35 to 65 years, 26.9% in the age up to 35 years, 53% fem ales, 81% living
in houses more than five years) was obtained by a correspondence form and also by electronic form
using a Google questionnaire. University education had 91% of all respondents and 95% of them rated
their standard of living as average or above average, 86% of all respondents worked mentally and 15%
were retired. About 82 % respondents were not exposed to occupational noise and only 5 % were
working on shifts. Approximately 57.6% of respondents remain and spend weekends in their dwellings
and 74.9 % devote their time regularly or irregularly to relaxing activities or personal interests.
Residents filled out questionnaires writing a subjective assessment of quality parameters of
housing, including the level of annoyance and interference with ac tivities, self-evaluation of theirhealth and lifestyle by using a four grade rating scale. The questionnaire comprised 43 questions
divided conceptually into the fields: house and home, traffic noise and housing, traffic noise and sleep,
work place and noise, lifestyle and health and the overall level of housing quality.
For statistical processing of data descriptive and bivariate analyses were used (t -test, chi-square
test, 2x2 tables) using the software packages EPI Info 7 and SPSS ver. 25.

3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
3.1 Exposure assessment
The questionnaire was supplemented by traffic noise-measurements in Bratislava, Martin, Trenčín,Piešťany on noisy facades 50 meters (L Aeq,day = from 57 dB to 72.4 dB, L Aeq,night = from 52.5 dB to 61.9dB) and more than 100 meters from noisy traffic communications or inner city corridor (table 1).
Outdoor noise levels in Tables 1 and 2 apply to noisy residential building facades within 1.5 -2.0 m
in front of the window of the living room on the floor level of the overhead flo or in accordance with thevalid Slovak legislation [8].
Measurements were carried out by accredited companies and professionally qualified persons withcalibrated sound-level technology, in some cases also as final approval measurements of new block offlats or residential buildings (RB) or after their reconstruction [4,5] (tables 1,2, graphs 1,2). The
corresponding 24-hour road traffic intensity assessments in selected Bratislava sites during working
days were during the day and evening in summer period 15,532 – 46,449 vehicles and during the night
1,583-5,116 vehicles (Municipality, Bratislava, 2016).

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Tab. 1. Equivalent noise levels LAeq,T and the indicator Lden for 24h measurements on noisy facades 50
meters from noisy traffic communications

No.

Locality of RB
Bratislava

Floor

L Aeq.T

L Aeq.T

L Aeq.T

/dB/

/dB/

/dB/

L dvn

T=06h-18h

T=18h-22h

T=22h-06h(2002/49/EC)

dayevening

night

/dB/

1

Gagarinova

7

72.0

68.0

60.3

71.7

2

Račianska

4

72.4

69.3

61.4

72.5

3

Námestie

SNP

3

62.4

62.8

59.7

67.0

4

Námestie 1.mája

4

64.8

63.1

61.9

68.9

5

Hodžovo námestie

4

71.0

68.7

64.0

72.7

6

Vajnorská

3

68.4

65.0

61.0

69.7

7

Námestie Slobody

5

66.6

65.0

58.5

68.0

(source: Sky-Eco, AZ Acoustic), Legend: RB=Residential Building

Fig. 1. The course of LAeq/1h measurements on noisy facades
communications

up to 50 meters from noisy traffic(numbers from 1 to 7 according the table 1)3567

Tab. 2 Equivalent noise levels LAeq,T and the indicator Lden for 24h measurements on noisy facades 100
meters from noisy traffic communications and inner city corridors
Locality of RB
No.

Bratislava (BA),
Trenčín (TN), Martin

Floor(MT), Piešťany (PN)

L Aeq,T

L Aeq,T

L Aeq,T

/dB/

/dB/

/dB/

L dvn

T=06h-18h

T=18h-22h

T=22h-06h(2002/49/EC)

dayevening

night

/dB/

1

BA, Račianska

5

57.4

53.9

49.7

58.5

2

BA, Strojnícka/Mierová

4

59.1

56.4

53.5

61.4

3

BA, Jégeho

5

57.7

54.1

48.5

58.3

4

BA, Lipského

3

60.5

57.8

49.7

60.7

5

MT, Kuzmányho

3

51.8

49.4

42.6

52.6

6

TN, Legionárska

3

53.4

52.3

48.3

56.3

7

PN, A.Hlinka

2

52.1

49.5

41.9

52.6

(Source: Sky-Eco, AZ Acoustic, Akustech), Legend: RB=Residential Building

Fig. 2. The course of LAeq/1h measurements on noisy facades more then approximately 100 meters fromnoisy traffic communications and inner city corridors (numbers from 1 to 7 according the table 2)

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3.2

Questionnaire – noise annoyance and sleep disturbance

The inhabitants with bedroom windows facing noisy streets or quite streets, inhabitants living in
the large cities or in the rural area and also at the distance less than 50 meters from noisy facades andmore than 100 meters from noisy traffic communications or inner city corridors represented theexposed and the control group.
Falling asleep, night and early morning awakening and closing windows due to annoyance are
significantly more frequent in respondents facing the bedroom window to noisy communications(OR=2.66; 95 % CI=1.64−4.31). Inhabitants living in the distance less than 50 meters from noisy
facades are significantly more awakened by road traffic noise (OR=1.76; 95 % CI=1.04−2.97).
Respondents from large cities use to close windows due to noise annoyance as well (OR=2.22; 95 %CI=1.47−3.37) (Table 3).
Tab. 3 Activities interfered by road traffic noise during the night (22h-06h) (n=543)
Activity interfered

Exposed andOdds ratio

Confidence interval

by road traffic

control group of

(OR)

(95%)

noise

respondents
Bratislava /large
cities + rural area

P-value

Lower limit

Upper limit

1.36

0.84

2.21

0.206

1.09

0.64

1.83

0.760

2.66

1.64

4.31

< 0.001

1.71

1.17

2.49

0.005

1.76

1.04

2.97

0.035

1.90

1.17

3.08

0.009

2.22

1.47

3.37

< 0.001

2.66

1.68

4.19

< 0.001

2.87

1.84

4.36

< 0.001

Distance from theFalling asleep

noisy
communication
Orientation of
bedroom windows
Bratislava /large
cities + rural area

Night and earlyDistance from themorning awakening

noisy
communication
Orientation of
bedroom windows
Bratislava /large
cities + rural area

Closing windows
due to annoyance

Distance from thenoisycommunication
Orientation of
bedroom windows3569

Tab. 4 Adaptation to noise and well-being during the day and night

Activity

Exposed andOdds ratio

Confidence interval

control group of

(OR)

(95%)

respondents
Bratislava /large
cities + rural area

Adaptation to road

Distance from thetraffic noise in the

noisy

night

communication
Orientation of
bedroom windows

Satisfaction with

Orientation ofquality of living

bedroom windows

Subjective noise

Orientation ofsensitivity

bedroom windows

Sleeplessness(n=543)

Orientation of
bedroom windows

P-value

Lower limit

Upper limit

2.02

1.36

3.01

0.001

1.18

0.78

1.78

0.438

1.16

0.75

1.78

0.507

0.35

0.20

0.61

< 0.001

0.507

0.34

0.75

< 0.001

2.54

1.38

4.92

< 0.001

The answers of respondents to their potential ability to adapt and to get used to traffic noise during
the night are shown in Table 4. In the exposed group from large cities 26.8% of respondents cannot
adapt to traffic noise compared to 35.5% in the control group. These results are also highly statisticallysignificant (p=0.001). Inhabitants with window orientation into noisy communications are
significantly less satisfied with their quality of living, are less noise sensitive and report more
sleeplessness (Table 4)
Preliminary results of our study are compatible and support the results of the other studies held in
Slovakia and abroad [7, 9,10,11,12]. However, subjective adaptation to noise the other authors did notstudy in such detail.
The outcomes of this pilot study support the hypothesis of subjectively higher level of interferencewith traffic noise of inhabitants living near urban transport communications (with a traffic of around
20,000 vehicles per day) and over-limit exposure to traffic noise on the noisy facades of residentialbuildings. The summer nights during working week (between 22h and 06h) are especially risky, whennoise acts especially troublesome during the time designated for regeneration and sleep. That wasproved by closing the windows of bedrooms especially in the summer night on the side of noisy
facades.
The comparison of selected groups of respondents may be affected by confounding factors, such as
relatively small sample size overall and the small sample size of the control group of respondents,
orientation of residential rooms and windows in residential buildings due to noisy communications,
floor height, and the subconscious psychological barrier of respondents in the exposed group as
property owners resulting from economic interest in their housing.
In the future analysis, we plan to enlarge the sample size, especially in the control group, and tofurther evaluate the health and lifestyle of respondents and to suggest precautions and interventional
procedures including of noise monitoring and evaluation inside of bedrooms.
There are three possible approaches to protect residents from road traffic noise; the first directed at
reducing the noise sources, the second at the modification of housing, and the third at reducing the3570

possibility of noise reaching the housing [1,2].

4. CONCLUSIONS
Our study was aimed at noise exposure assessment and subjective annoyance by traffic noise of
inhabitants living in big cities, near urban transport communications and with bedroom windows
facing noisy streets. The outcomes of this pilot study support the hypothesis of subjectively higher
level of interference with different day and night activities and the assumption of increased health risk.
Respondents from the large cities seems to better adapt to road traffic noise and respondents withbedroom windows oriented toward noisy communication are less noise sensitive.
After completion of the results, we plan to propose interim measures to noisy facades of theapartment buildings as well as intervention procedures in the prevention of adverse effect s of traffic
noise on health. Reliable information’s about quite zones, facades or silent bedrooms in newapartment buildings and urban area can be important for noise sensitive inhabitants etc.
The health impact of noise from neighbor housing and indoor noise sources should be taken into
account as well.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This contribution was partially supported by the company SKY-ECO, s.r.o., Bratislava, Slovakia

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