Tranquillity mapping in New Zealand national parks - a pilot study
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2020-12Rights
(c) 2020 The Authors. This is an Open Access article distributed under the Creative Commons CC-BY license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/)Peer-Reviewed
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openAccessAccepted for publication
2020-11-03
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The tranquillity in national parks worldwide is currently under threat from intrusion of anthropogenic noise of a growing tourism industry and activity related to park management. This was addressed by creating informative tranquillity maps, where perceived tranquillity can be considered a key indicator of soundscape quality in natural areas. Tranquillity of an area can be assessed using TRAPT (Tranquillity Rating Prediction Tool), that has been developed and refined for assessing urban green spaces, national parks and wilderness areas in the United Kingdom. The subjective response to helicopter noise levels of a sample group of 35 people representing the general New Zealand population was obtained, based on visual and audio stimuli that were collected in Aoraki/Mt Cook National Park. These results were used to produce a revised TRAPT equation. It was discovered that levels under 32 dBA correspond to an excellent level of tranquillity. This thresholdwas used to produce a noise level exposure calculation for two national parks using noise prediction model AEDT (Aviation Environmental Development Tool). Contours representing tranquillity duration were then calculated and plotted, to serve as a planning tool for use by the Department of Conservation. A similar approach could be used for other national parks worldwideVersion
Published versionCitation
Watts GR, Pearse J, Delikostidis I et al (2020) Tranquillity mapping in New Zealand national parks - a pilot study. Noise Mapping. 7(1): 303-315.Link to Version of Record
https://doi.org/10.1515/noise-2020-0025Type
Articleae974a485f413a2113503eed53cd6c53
https://doi.org/10.1515/noise-2020-0025