If town decides to electronically crack down on loud mufflers, it shouldn’t observe the street it did with pink mild cameras.
New York Metropolis, Knoxville, Tennessee, and London have put in cameras with microphones to catch motorists and motorcyclists whose autos exceed authorized noise limits. Because the Solar-Occasions’ David Struett reported, Chicago is contemplating going that route with a downtown system that would go into operation subsequent 12 months. The following step is to carry it earlier than the Metropolis Council’s Public Security Committee.
At instances, particularly after darkish, downtown neighborhoods might be victims of ear-splitting noise as a result of some motorists and bike riders like to switch or minimize off their mufflers to make their autos exceptionally loud. That may be jarring for folks residing in a crowded city space.
The Illinois Car Code prohibits modifying “the exhaust system of a motorized vehicle in a way which can amplify or enhance the noise of such car,” however some folks say police don’t crack down sufficiently.
But an automatic system shouldn’t evoke the times when pink mild cameras generated spurious tickets for individuals who both needed to pay or take time to contest the citations. Tickets for overly loud mufflers needs to be issued solely when there’s little question of a violation and who dedicated it.
The push for digital monitoring grew out of labor by eight group leaders who merely need quieter streets, and that, not a money seize, ought to stay the main focus.
The goal of the crackdown isn’t folks on their solution to a muffler store for a restore. Somewhat, the ordinance could be aimed toward autos that may be heard from as a lot as a mile away, resounding within the canyons of Loop skyscrapers and alongside Decrease Wacker Drive. All that noise, which may injury folks’s listening to, is pointless.
“Clearly, when folks minimize off the exhaust pipe and go up and down the road and across the block in a high-density neighborhood, you must conclude they’re merely vandals,” Craig Kaiser, head of Streeterville Neighborhood Advocates and a member of Noise Free America, advised us.
The proposed system would triangulate the supply of an excessively loud muffler and seize video of the car, together with its license plate. The system needs to be designed in a means that no person is dinged for atypical site visitors noise or for being too near a car with a tampered muffler.
Mufflers modified to create a din haven’t any place in a metropolis. Police and the Metropolis Council ought to work collectively to place a cork in them.
The Solar-Occasions welcomes letters to the editor and op-eds. See our guidelines.
