Impulsivity of Noise due to Single Lightweight Vehicles Transit on Transverse Rumble Strip

¹ Faculty of Civil Engineering, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, 81310 Johor Bahru, Johor, Malaysia
² Faculty of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Universiti Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia, 86400 Parit Raja, Batu Pahat Johor, Malaysia

^* Corresponding author: nddarus@yahoo.com

Abstract

Transverse Rumble Strips (TRS) acts as safety device that alert inattentive drivers from potential dangers. However, the noise produced due to TRS was reported as noise annoyance among the nearby residents lived adjacent to roadways. Thus, this paper investigates the impulsivity characteristic of noise due to single lightweight vehicles transit on TRS. The objectives of this study are to determine the increase of sound level and to evaluate the impulsivity of noise. Two TRS profiles namely middle overlapped (MO) and middle layer overlapped (MLO) were selected. Three types of single lightweight vehicles which include hatchback, sedan and multipurpose (MPV) were tested at speed of 30, 50 and 70km/h. The sound level was measured using sound level meter (SLM). Noise indices such as L_Aeq, L_AIeqT, L_AImax, L_AFmax and L_ASmax were obtained from the measurement. This study considered the differences of L_AImax – L_AFmax > 2dBA, L_AFmax – L_Aeq ≥ 10dBA, L_AIeqT – L_Aeq ≥ 2dBA and L_AImax – L_ASmax > 6dBA to evaluate the impulsivity of noise. It was found that TRS increased the sound level by at most of 6dBA. Furthermore, all single lightweight vehicles transit on TRS show significant impulsive characteristic. These results proved that TRS produce significant impact to the nearby residents.