High-speed maglev noise impacts on residents: A case study in Shanghai

High-speed maglev trains offer competitive journey-times to automobile and air transport in markets of 60–1000 miles but they have potentially adverse noise impacts. This paper considers the noise characteristics of the Shanghai Maglev Train on residents within 300 m to the track. It shows that the system is about 4–8 dBA quieter than other high-speed systems at comparable speeds with their guideways at a similar distance. One of the train’s noise characteristics is that LASmax drops 7–10 dBA as distance from the guideway doubles. The onset rate within 30 m-distance to the maglev track is more than 20 dB/s, and 86.5% of respondents complained they had been startled when traveling beneath the guideway when it was in use. High speed maglev noise annoyance is not found to be strongly related to demographic variables, other than that home owners are more annoyed than renters. The linear dose-response relationships between HA% and LASmax is developed to evaluate the impacts of high-speed rail systems, with the finding that LASmax is more appropriate than calculated LAeq to as a descriptor of noise level and limit boundary.