NEWPORT BEACH : Ordinance to Address Concerns Over Noise

Leaf blowers and air conditioners will be focuses of discussion today as the City Council prepares to pass the city’s first comprehensive noise ordinance.

Outgoing council members Evelyn R. Hart and Jean H. Watt want to outlaw gas leaf blowers, but outgoing Mayor Clarence J. Turner has said such a law would be impossible to enforce.

Most residents who have spoken to the council on the issue favor tighter noise controls, but disagree on the best way to impose them.

Regulating air conditioners has also proved problematic, because many areas of the city have closely quartered homes with minimal side yards, where most air conditioners are mounted.

Because so much of the city’s housing stock is 40 or more years old, their air conditioners may be noisy due to age or improper maintenance. The new rules would allow those air conditioners to remain until the end of the century but would require new units to meet lower noise levels.

Options the council will consider include measuring the noise air conditioners generate from outside nearby homes or from inside and outside nearby homes; banning side yard mounts for new and replacement air conditioners and requiring front yard or roof mounts instead, or limiting allowable hours of use, with a suggested shut-off time of 10 p.m.

In general, the law will classify all properties in the city as residential, commercial or industrial and assign acceptable noise limits for each.

Noise-generating activities in commercial or industrial areas would be expected to maintain the lower-level standards of residential areas if the sounds carry that far. Under the regulations, daytime is 7 a.m. to 10 p.m., nighttime is 10 p.m. to 7 a.m.

Property maintenance is a separately regulated activity, with noisy functions limited to 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. weekdays and Saturdays and 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. Sundays.

The ordinance would bring together noise regulations that have been scattered throughout ordinances governing other matters, such as public nuisances and construction permits.