Paris Extending Anti-noise Drive

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 79, Issue 283, 3 December 1935, Page 10

Paris Extending Anti-noise Drive

NO DAYTIME BLARE TO BE ALLOWED POLICE CAKKY LONG LIST OF FORBIDDEN INROADS .ON CITY’S TAKI-. —Unsolved to rid itself of the reputation of being the world's ii«.isie>t city, Paris is intensifying its paigu. Jnstructions have . if strictly en- ■ ■[. d. w 1! transform the French capital into a citv of comparative silence. , ■ s already in • • several w eeks, t hanks to which no honking may be heard between 9 at night and 8 in the morning, >teps have now been taken to lessen davtime noises as well. Screeching brakes, popping motorcycles, roaring klaxons, rattling a-hcan>, rumbling trucks, banging engines, wist ii g tugs, ranting radios—- ■ esc ; i a few of the noisemakers which have now been banned, or subjected to strict regulation. A circular has been distributed to nil police officials by the Paris authorities calling on them to apply and ienforce these silence measures, and laying down the rule that “repression uf noise, night and day, has become an important part of the duties of the guardians of the peace.” Always the Other Fellow Recalling the ruling passed in 1931 that “all unnecessary noises, or sounds due to a lack of precaution, which are of such a nature as to disturb rest and ••aim of the populace, are forbidden.” the circular points out that anyone making such noises is punish"’ e by a line of 11 to 15 francs (3/- to 4/-). With the siugle exception of the nocturnal suppression of automobile horns and klaxons, however, this decree ha- until now remained a dead letter. Noise was a habit, in Paris, and one not easy to correct. Each individual had a typical tendency, to consider his own noises as necessary, while only his neighbours’ were “unnecessary” and “due to a lack of precauTo get around this difficulty, the policeman of the capital have now been furnished with lists of the offending sounds and have been instructed to exercise special diligence in silencing them. If the “flics” (French for ‘‘cops” or “Bobbies”) take their instructions seriously, then a new era of quietness is in sight for Parisians. Carpet-Beating Hours The most significant of these instructions are those . relative to the radio. Recognizing that the bellowing of inconsiderate amplifiers has become a scourge of the city, the circular prescribes that it is the duty of policemen to respond immediately to any appeals from harassed tenants

whose neighbour’s radio or phonogn\'‘i is making itself heard all over . . building—or even, as often happens, .'1 over the neighbourhood. The thunderous rumble of he:., trucks is another source of unpleasant sound which has now been regulator. All trucks have been limited to spe of from 12 to 25 miles per hour, : those with solid tires have been coffined to even fewer speed limits, addition, solid-tired trucks have b entirely barred from certain streets ? night. Ash-cans and garbage containers, :t is proved, must no longer be “drag -1 about and thrown down” upon ’.s sidewalk, but must in future be “carried and carefully deposited.” lhe same ruling also applies to the famii m clatter of milk cans. Carpets, in accordance with an ■" ’ Parisian custom, can still be bea-.en out of the windows of flats, but th* 1 ?? beatings must be confined, in sumi.::r to the single hour between 7 and 8 and in winter to the two-hour per : 1 between 7 and 9. In the case of a ■ - dows opening on courts, however, Lt beating is allowed to reverbate three hours in the morning and to *-■ sound again for an hour in the afternoon.