Sounds in Public Places

[Rod]

Now listen up!

The windmill thread has become unwieldy ? so I am starting a new thread though I have just been reading Dave Liquorice and Mary Fisher discussing low frequency sound "up the way" and that is what has prompted this post. The mosquito thread also seems potentially relevant. The presence of several people with in-depth understanding of sound and noise helps. :-)

The other day I went to Tesco at Loudwater. (What an exciting life I lead!) Something seemed odd throughout my visit but it really became obvious while at the till. I couldn?t hear properly any more.

It felt like being in a dream. The checkout operator must have said something but their voice was distant and quiet. The beeps, rattles, and other common din at the till was much less obvious than normal.

Usually in this particular Tesco (and many other stores), I find the volume unpleasant, almost painful. The racket made by the refrigeration plant is bad and varies in bands or rays or nodes up and down the aisles (never have quite worked it out) where (I imagine) the sounds from various sources interfere. The noise of the tills is annoying.

But this time it was almost like the air was not transmitting sound as well as usual. I did not notice the refrigeration plant nearly as much as usual.

On leaving, my hearing initially felt dampened down as if I had become partially deaf. It seemed to recover over the next tens of minutes. And I mentioned the experience to partner. She felt almost exactly the same as I had.

I suffer from high pitched tinnitus. Partner suffers from deeper tinnitus. We both exhibit some signs of hyperacusis.

Neither of us noticed anything different about the store (e.g. new acoustic tiles).

After discussing it with partner, I wondered if they could have installed some sort of anti-noise device to reduce the sound levels in the store?

Any suggestions? Any explanations?

[Grimly Curmudgeon]

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember Rod saying something like:

You should have removed your noise-cancelling headphones before paying.

Actually, it's possible there was some form of noise cancelling going on in the store, perhaps just to see if customers complained about it.

[Another Dave]

I don't know, but I shop at Tesco SOLELY because they don't play music. I drive past three music-infested competitors on the way simply so that I can shop in comparative silence.

Another Dave.

[Mary Fisher]

I haven't been in Tesco for years, Sainsbury for almost as long, Asda only once and rarely in Morrison's but I haven't herd musack in any of them for a VERY long time.

Mary

[Rod]

You obviously don't go shopping there in December. :-)

[John]

How can anyone shop at Xmas without Slade and Bing??

[Dave Plowman (News)]

With pleasure?

[John Rumm]

A couple of possibilities spring to mind...

First if Bluewater is anything like lakeside (large covered concourse area with shops that open directly onto it without the usual doors), then you may experience unwanted effects from the changes in barometric pressure. The AC is designed to keep the main concourse pressure slightly higher than that in the shops. This ensures there is a nett flow of air into the shop, so that should there be a fire in a shop the smoke is contained in it and does not spill out into the shared area.

I find the subtle pressure changes experienced from more than about an hour of walking in an out of shops there is enough to give me a headache.

Second possibility, some shopping centres employ a device known as the mosquito:

emits a loud constant whine at high frequency that is designed to make it uncomfortable to congregate in close proximity to it for any length of time. The intention being to cause groups of youths to not loiter, and the (rather dodgy) assumption being that older shoppers hearing will not longer have the high frequency sensitivity to hear it.

[RW]

Some of these will defer the problem

[Terry Fields]

I was once walking down the Strand one lunch-time, when I suddenly became aware that I could only hear with difficulty - it came on suddenly, lasted a couple of seconds, then cleared. Very strange. Then a few moments later it did it again.

I realised that I was walking in the same direction as the traffic, and I was alongside a London taxi. Every time the taxi put its brakes on, I went deaf without hearing anything.

I realised the taxi's brakes were squeaking quite loudly, but at a frequency that I couldn't hear - my cut-off these days is about 11 kHz.

I wonder if your Tesco is countering the ambient noise by turning people's hearing down in this way? It might have the added benefit of stopping youngsters buying booze, hanging around, etc etc.

[Rod]

... were what I had posted about! I actually typed Loudwater (which is near High Wycombe).

No - just a large shed-like standard Tesco design.

Nice idea - but seems inapplicable.

Thought of that (hence mention of mosquito in original post) - but I am surely far too old to hear one. And loads of younger citizens in the shop not showing any more than ordinary levels of distress. I think a mosquito would have a hard job being heard over my tinnitus. :-)

[Mary Fisher]

I don't shop in December :-)

Well, as little as possible. Waitrose had no musack.

Mary

[RobertL]

Our local tesco has music from little TVs dotted all throughout the store. When they first installed them they left the controls exposed and the shoppers turned them down. Now they have littlel covers over the controls. This tesco (newmarket Road, Cambridge) is used as a "test bed" so you might expect otehr stores to follow this trend.

I hate it and try to shop elsewhere.

Robert

[Rod]

The local rotary club playing third rate carols very loud on a clapped out sound system in the car park was enough inside Waitrose... :-)

[John Rumm]

Ah, sorry assumed you were passing satirical comment on the latest temple devoted to the god of shopping! ;-)

Well that is where the assumption of the manufacturers can fall down - just because you are over 20 does guarantee your won't hear it - although it is less likely. Also there can be physiological effects of sounds even when not expressly audible.

Perhaps you just have an adverse reaction to being dragged round the shops! ;-)

[Mary Fisher]

...

I have :-(

Mary

[Mark]

I wonder if it was a "white/pink noise" source? I once worked in a building with one of those and it had a similar effect of masking other sounds.

M.

[Derek Geldard]

Well, that would be difficult if you rarely, if ever, go in (they'd tend to scatter and hide round the ends of the fixtures.)

DG

[Dave Liquorice]

So does the one we go to regularly (Carlisle) and others I drop into from time to time. It's subtle and some nasty swirly smooth sound, no rythum or beat as such.

[David in Normandy]

At the last Christmas carnival we attended in Nottingham, the organisers had arranged for similar stalls to be grouped together. They had clearly not thought this through, as the arrangement of an ancient steam organ right next to a small stage for the Carol singers resulted in an awful cacophony with everyone hurrying past the clashing noise as quick as they could!