Noise pollution impacts minority communities disproportionately

by Daniel Fink, MD, Chair, The Quiet Coalition

Photo credit: Pixabay

There can be no rational doubt that noise pollution affects poor and minority communities disproportionately. Why is this true? A recent Washington Post article looked into air pollution and found that factories were more often located in poor neighborhoods, and if they were located in wealthier neighborhoods, the wealthy moved to cleaner locations.

The Post’s Department of Data report, written by columnist Andrew Van Dam, discussed research showing that eastern neighborhoods in many older cities, including London, Paris and others in the northeastern United States, were poor and had been poor for decades, if not centuries. Research by several economists correlated the poverty in the eastern neighborhoods with air pollution from coal-burning factories ushered in by prevailing west to east winds. The results of that air pollution are still felt today.

A Ph.D. thesis showed that in the United States, “census tracts located downwind of highly polluted 1970s  industrial sites are associated with lower housing prices and a smaller share of skilled employment three decades later, a pattern which became evermore prominent between 1980 and 2000.” Research by American University economist Claudia Persico went on to show that poor children exposed to pollutants in utero had worse educational and life outcomes than their siblings who had not been exposed.

The Post’s article doesn’t address noise pollution, but the major highways weren’t built in the wealthy parts of town. In the Los Angeles area, for example, a proposed freeway along Santa Monica Boulevard — the historic Route 66 — was successfully fought by the wealthy neighborhoods through which it would have passed. The Santa Monica Freeway, or Interstate 10, was built several miles to the south, through poor neighborhoods. Those neighborhoods are still noisier than the neighborhoods that were able to fight off the proposed freeway. I’m sure there are similar stories in many cities across the country. Similarly, it was unlikely that airports would be built in or near wealthy neighborhoods.

It’s not clear what can be done to reverse decades of environmental racism but a special 2021 issue of Environmental Health Perspectives offers background information on the problem. There’s even a correlation between noise pollution and crime. If elected officials wanted to reduce crime, maybe they could start by focusing on noise pollution?

One thing is certain: A quieter world will be a better and healthier world for all.