Needs for the public re-education and future noise policy at the local level in Japan: Experiments in remaking understandable Noise Exposure Level data base

摘要

Generally, it is said that the Japanese public concern about noise pollution issues have recently been gradually weakening, even though it should be considered that people are still exposed to excessive noise levels in their daily lives and there are still considerable disputed serious noise problems/conflicts at the local level. In view of such a current situation, the Environmental Laboratories Association in Japan (ELA/J), which is organized by the noise expert members who are working for the local governmental environmental laboratories within Japan, have recently considered the needs for "public reeducation", which should be started to develop understandable materials for the general people about noise exposure issues in daily life and which are needed to support a possible future transition from a centralized to a more decentralized noise policy system in Japan. In this paper, the environmental noise level data-base entitled "The Index of Noise" which was carried out by the ELA/J will be introduced in order to show noise exposure levels for the general public's daily life. Additionally, suggestions are made concerning how a sustainable local level noise policy should be developed.