Key Elements Related to Context and Morphology for the Acoustic Design of Urban Environments

In urban sound planning, the tendency is to look at the city as a larger network of infrastructures and neighborhoods, instead of looking at the diverse city spaces at a smaller scale. The acoustic experience cannot only be related to sound emissions from traffic, but to the perception of sound in relation to the architecture, functionality and social aspects of a space. The quality of the urban acoustic environment does therefore depend on the urban morphology and its context and not only on quantitative measures. The challenge is that this relationship is easier to identify in existing areas than during the planning process. In this paper, the urban planning and design process is studied and related to the analysis of existing design and assessment methods for the urban acoustic environment. The aim is to identify at which stages configurations affecting the acoustic quality are defined and how they can be addressed using the existing methods. The findings of the study express the need of more comprehensive approaches to the holistic design of urban acoustic environments.