A High-Tech Effort To Minimize Sound In The New York Subway

Silencing The New York Subway

If you’ve ever stood in the deafening racket of the Spring Street subway station in Manhattan and asked yourself, “Hmm, I wonder if standing here is a terrible idea?” then a quick consultation of the noise exposure standards promulgated in June 1998 by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health will show that, indeed, standing there is a terrible idea.

During the lull between trains, the station is a quiet enough place. You can hear a woman’s boot heel clacking against the concrete platform, the MetroCard reader’s piercing electronic beep, the click-click-click of spinning turnstiles, a train in an adjacent tunnel shaking the walls with tectonic rumble.

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