Public pressure - An effective force II

A fifth Global Noise Policy Workshop was held during INTER-NOISE 2007 in Istanbul, Turkey, on Wednesday, August 29. The theme of this workshop was “Public Pressure—an Effective Force.” The all-day workshop featured sessions with presentations by informed parties from countries around the world. Each session was followed by a question-and answer discussion period. The Workshop was organized by Janet Moss of the Noise Control Foundation, Poughkeepsie, New York. Three sessions were organized. The presentations and discussions have been assembled by Janet Moss into a “Source Book” which is available from the Foundation (noisecontrolfoundation@ gmail.com). This feature article contains summaries of the panelists that spoke in the second and third sessions. The summaries from the first session appeared in the March issue of this magazine. Panelists spoke on the effectiveness of public pressure to influence legislators to enact noise control policy. The topics addressed during the three sessions included the following: • Generating public involvement through education, • support from NGO interest groups, and • effective use of the media. Many participants in earlier workshops have been engineers knowledgeable in the technical aspects of noise control; here we sought to involve the public and those organizations that represent the public. Remember, it was public pressure that led to the movement in many countries to ban smoking in public buildings. Could public pressure also be effective in reducing noise in our communities?