Yes please. All of the straight pipe truck idiots, “loud pipes save lives” motorcycles and other various inconsiderate morons just ruin quality of life in cities. In places like SF, it won’t discriminate (exclusively) by class either. One of the worst offenders in my old neighborhood was some deplorable in a modified Lamborghini SUV.
I can't understand why the enforced decibel level is 95 for cars and 80 for motorcycles. Motorcycles are probably, by percentage, the worst offenders for this, but it seems like a decibel from one vehicle is as loud as a decibel from another, so I wonder why there's a double standard.<p>The biggest argument against this seems to be the creeping surveillance state. I agree with that, and it would indeed be better if this was enforced by 'old-fashioned' police and their old-fashioned ears. But they don't, for whatever reason, and I wish they would. It's frustrating.<p>And it's not that I like being surveilled, but I think speed trap cameras and red light cameras are generally worse than this (because you can accidentally go over the speed limit, but you can't accidentally install a loud aftermarket exhaust pipe) so this isn't as much of a problem for me as it seems for some people.<p>At one level I'll even appreciate the sweet revenge on the inconsiderate people whose unnecessarily loud vehicles have been annoying me for decades.
I'm really happy to see governments finally waking up to the problems caused by noise pollution (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_effects_from_noise" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_effects_from_noise</a>).<p>Another thing that I have maintained for quite some time is that car horns should be at as loud inside the car as out. It's kinda crazy to me that we're ok with people making such loud noises while being completely isolated from them.
I hope this tech catches on, we have a ton people who like to tear around my neighborhood at 4AM in cars with exhaust mods.<p>A few times it’s been loud enough to wake up my infant, at which point I’d probably vote to upgrade it a capital crime…
> Some cars and many motorcycles, depending on the road and driving style, will easily exceed the 95 and 80 decibel limits straight from the factory. Based on Car and Driver testing, examples include the 2016 Porsche 911 GT3 RS (108 decibels) and the 2019 Chevrolet Corvette ZR1 and 2019 McLaren 720S Spider, both at 99 decibels.<p>Seems crazy to me that manufacturers are selling cars that are basically designed to be a nuisance.
I really wish human enforcement would happen instead of robotic police state starter edition.<p>There really aren't that many violators and it's not like speeding where anybody does it, just revoke the registration of any car caught going a certain amount over and make them tow it on the spot and pass an inspection before it can be legally back on the road.<p>It's usually just one dude in the neighborhood that has an obnoxious car.
I wish we'd do something like a revenue neutral noise pollution registration fee, where the top 25% loudest things on the road pay a higher fee which is used to give a discount to the bottom 49%... creating an incentive to drive noise pollution levels continually down.
Near me in Southern California, it’s cameros/corvettes (I call these cheap sports cars) and trucks with out of state plates. Generally not the modified Nissans/Hondas. Bring it on with these rules! Sick of walking down the street and hearing a car going 40 sound like a race car going 150. Loud exhaust is nothing more than people trying to compensate for not getting the attention they crave in other venues in life. Same with trucks with massive/unpractical lifts. You don’t get any off road benefits above a few inches and the lift just becomes about looking intimidating which is not a part of American culture I enjoy having to deal with
I personally know three people who have had their catalytic converters stolen in the last two months. I hope there's an exception for trying to get back home after some degenerate has stolen $600 of palladium off your exhaust system!<p>That said, I still 100% support this bill. Noise pollution is a real thing, and it sucks. "Cities aren't loud, cars are loud."
As common decency dilapidates, I wonder if we will just use technology to find and shame.<p>The ‘war on noise’ is probably just the beginning. Why wouldn’t you deploy this technology to stop littering, etc.?<p>The end result might be Singapore and beyond:)
Who gets the ticket if a law abiding driver is in frame with a scofflaw?<p>Exhaust noise regulations are generally based on a specific distance and orientation at ground level. How are they going to prove that they met those conditions?<p>95dB for cars but only 80dB for motorcycles. I doubt my 15 year old bike meets that with its stock exhaust. Regardless, now a car can trip the camera and the blame falls on someone driving a quieter vehicle.
In my city, there was a big criminal operation stealing catalytic converters from cars parked on the street during lockdown. A lot of cars are still missing them and we all know who drives those cars: poor people living paycheck to paycheck.<p>As long as we have so much poverty and wealth inequality, I will aggressively oppose brutal laws with such out-of-touch priorities as noise pollution.
I like the sound of a properly built V8. They should be exempt from that law. If it's a 4 cylinder machine with a fart exhaust, those should be banned. 12 cylinder Ferraris should also be worshiped, not fined.<p>An air-cooled VW Bug with a stinger exhaust should get a special exemption, too, just for being California cool.
I live on a hill by a major state highway intersection in an area where jake brakes are allowed. This is also within olfactory distance of the water treatment plant.<p>It's great because none of the people who cheer on this sort of dystopian "use the state's monopoly on violence to enforce the pettiest of petty laws" wind up living here.<p>Edit: Since apparently these things need to be said, because HN, imagine your living situation isn't stable and you don't get the fine because it was mailed to your last apartment or you simply fail to pay it, what happens then, and how is that different than if you had stiffed anyone other than the state?
Bubb Rubb and Lil Sis would disapprove. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zUXow3d3-b0" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zUXow3d3-b0</a>
It's always seemed very odd to me that California is known both for its hot-rodding culture that encourages vehicle modifications, and at the same time has extremely strict emissions laws.<p>That said, as an enthusiast of vehicle performance improvements myself, there's a huge variance in how exhaust sounds are perceived even if they're the same volume. To me, high-pitched screaming is far more obnoxious than low-frequency rumbling.
Different pavements have different noise characteristics, and poor pavement decisions probably contribute the most to noise.<p>Will the state fine itself for loud pavement? Do they even have a standard they would hold themselves to for loud pavement?<p>I'm all in favor of reducing exhaust noise, but without going after loud pavement, it is a waste of time.
A much better way of handling this issue in CA is just to add a sound test when getting a smog check. Pretty much all cars get smogged and while it won't stop everyone, it will deter many from installing such systems.
I wish this applied to fire trucks. I’ve been woken up too many times by a fire truck blasting their horn at 2am when there’s no traffic in the street, waking up 200+ people in the process.
I would rather California work harder on enforcement against smoking tobacco everywhere.<p>In my city it's illegal to smoke in city parks, yet people do it inside my neighborhood parks nearly every day. Many times when young families with children are around and inhaling it second-hand.
The office space near campus here has some expensive business suites, and by casual chat one day, I found that not one or two, but a whole corner of one floor was rented out to a company making automated traffic cameras, and most of the people in the office were speaking some Slavic language I had never heard before .. this is California. It is obviously a profit center.<p>whoever owns the right to these automated systems, owns a money-printing machine and everyone involved knows it.
On the topic of driving legislature and enforcement in general, I hate the sentiment of speed limits. It's a mishmash of trying to reduce fatalities by making person-and-vehicle collisions happen at a slower speed that is <i>for some reason</i> applied to the motorway.<p>For anyone that has gone 155mph on the Autobahns unlimited section, it becomes blatantly obvious that modern high end cars are meant to do that sort of speed, and there's nothing that scary about it when you have 6 lanes and keep a few hundred meters of braking distance. The fact that 90mph would get your license taken away in the U.K. makes me sick considering that almost all little crapbox cars sold in Europe happily break that limit (even if they're screaming in 5th gear).