Assessment of urban soundscapes with the focus on an architectural installation with musical features

Abstract

Urban soundscapes at five locations in the city of Zadar were perceptually assessed by on-site surveys and objectively evaluated based on monaural and binaural recordings. All locations were chosen so that they would display auditory and visual diversity as much as possible. The unique sound installation known as the Sea Organ was included as an atypical music-like environment. Typical objective parameters were calculated from the recordings related to the amount of acoustic energy, spectral properties of sound, the amount of fluctuations, and tonal properties. The subjective assessment was done on-site using a common survey for evaluating the properties of sound and visual environment. The results revealed the importance of introducing the context into soundscape research because objective parameters did not show significant correlation with responses obtained from interviewees. Excessive values of certain objective parameters could indicate that a sound environment will be perceived as unpleasant or annoying, but its overall perception depends on how well it agrees with people's expectations. This was clearly seen for the case of Sea Organ for which the highest values of objective parameters were obtained, but, at the same time, it was evaluated as the most positive sound environment in every aspect.

Influence of urban contexts on soundscape perceptions: A structural equation modeling approach

“…), (4) sounds from human beings (conversation, laughter, children at play, and footsteps) and (5) natural sounds (wind, water, and birds). This classification of sound sources has been widely utilized in soundscape studies (Axelsson et al, 2010;Jambrošić, Horvat, & Domitrović, 2013;Jeon, Hwang, & Hong, 2014;Lindborg, 2015) due to its utility for laypeople. In addition, the previous studies using the protocol show significant correlations between sound source identification responses and perceptions of acoustic environments.…”

“…It is important to achieve a harmonious relationship between a landscape and a soundscape to build better urban environments because the congruity between the sound and visual environments affects the perceptions of environmental quality (Carles et al, 1999;Jambrošić et al, 2013;Viollon et al, 2002). For instance, even if a visual environment is appropriate in a given place, if the soundscape is not appropriate, the overall environment might be perceived as disharmonious.…”

“…For instance, even if a visual environment is appropriate in a given place, if the soundscape is not appropriate, the overall environment might be perceived as disharmonious. The quality of a perceived environment depends on its harmony with the contextual factors of the location such as the functions of places and a sense of places (Brambilla, Di Gabriele, Maffei, & Verardi, 2008;Ge & Hokao, 2005;Jambrošić et al, 2013;Jeon et al, 2014;Raimbault & Dubois, 2005). Therefore, the harmony of the sound and visual environments with a given location was evaluated with the following question: "Do you feel the sound (or visual) environment is harmonious for the given location?"…”

Assessment of the masking effects of birdsong on the road traffic noise environment

“…The adjectives have been identified as the characteristics of soundscape quality in previous studies, one of the most commonly used of which is pleasantness 13,14,45 . For the perceptual assessment of traffic noise, perceived annoyance is an important and frequently examined characteristic 1,4,46,47 .…”

Synthesis of a Virtual Urban Soundscape

“…Objective assessments are typically performed by means of noise level measurements, or by more quantitative parameters [16,17]. Subjective aspects have been investigated through surveys in situ or by listening tests based on monaural or binaural recordings [18][19][20].…”