Highway Noise Abatement Measures PDF Download

During the rapid expansion of the Interstate Highway System and other roadways in the 20th century, communities began to recognize that highway traffic noise and construction noise had the potential to cause environmental impacts. In the 1972 Federal-aid Highway Act, Congress required FHWA to develop a noise standard for new federal-aid highway projects. While providing national criteria and requirements for all highway agencies, the FHWA Noise Standard allows flexibility for highway agencies to incorporate state-specific objectives into their highway traffic and construction noise policies. This policy contains the ARDOT criteria for defining highway traffic noise impacts; how noise abatement will be evaluated; and how noise abatement decisions will be made. ARDOT is required to evaluate whether the predicted noise levels could result in highway traffic noise impacts as part of the general environmental review process associated with all federal Type I projects. If noise impacts are identified for federal-aid projects, the consideration of reasonable and feasible noise abatement measures is required. In most cases, projects requiring an Environmental Assessment (EA) or Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) will contain a noise analysis report; however, a noise analysis is required on all Type I projects. Noise impacts will be reported in EA, EIS, and Categorical Exclusion (CE) documents. A glossary containing the acronyms and definitions of terms used in this policy can be found in Appendix C.