A new contributed article presenting an overview of the SONYC project appears in the February 2019 edition of the Communications of the ACM. The article, together with a video in which SONYC’s Juan P. Bello and Charlie Mydlarz discuss the project and our progress to date, are featured online.
SONYC: A System for Monitoring, Analyzing, and Mitigating Urban Noise Pollution:
SONYC has launched a new audio annotation campaign on the Zooniverse citizen science platform. Listen and annotate selected recordings from our acoustic sensors to help teach our machine listening algorithms about urban sound.
As part of NYU’s Applied Research Innovations in Science and Engineering (ARISE) program, New York City high school students Giordan Escalona and Elizabeth Mendoza joined the Center for Urban Science and Progress (CUSP) for five weeks this summer. Hosted by CUSP team members Juan Pablo Bello, Mark Cartwright, and Vincent Lostanlen, Elizabeth and Giordan contributed to the acoustic sensor and citizen science research agendas of SONYC. Giordan is a senior at the Browning School, and Elizabeth is a junior at Forest Hills High School.
Summer 2018 saw the initial SONYC ieSoSC program, held over 4 weeks through July and August. Organized in conjunction with NYU Tandon Centre for K-12 STEM Education, this was an unbelievable experience during which we introduced 24 middle school students from diverse backgrounds, and three New York public school teachers (who helped us develop and deliver the content), to the research and concerns that underpin and motivate SONYC. In this post we briefly present just a few activities from amongst the many highlights.
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SONYC PI Juan Bello and Cecil McMaster, Deputy Commissioner and Chief Information Officer at NYC Environmental Protection, talk about SONYC at the US Ignite Application Summit in Kansas City, March 2018.
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SONYC researcher Charlie Mydlarz appeared on News 12 Brooklyn’s 8pm and 10pm broadcasts, May 30th 2018, to discuss the project and the sensors newly installed in the busy Fulton Mall as part of the SONYC project’s partnership with Downtown Brooklyn Alliance. Watch the interview at:
An overview article describing the SONYC project has been accepted for publication in Communications of the ACM:
SONYC: A System for the Monitoring, Analysis and Mitigation of Urban Noise Pollution
J. P. Bello, C. Silva, O. Nov, R. L. DuBois, A. Arora, J. Salamon, C. Mydlarz, H. Doraiswamy
Communications of the ACM (CACM), In press, 2018.
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SONYC are partnering with Downtown Brooklyn Partnership (DBP), a not-for-profit that manages three Business Improvement Districts in the area, to monitor noise pollution as part of a new “Living Lab” initiative. DBP president Regina Myrer said in a statement, “Smart city technology is making communities around the world safer, cleaner and more beautiful places to live, and the Living Lab program brings new, data-driven solutions that will improve the quality of life here in Downtown Brooklyn, and potentially to other cities.” SONYC sensors will be operating from several sites along the Fulton Mall. DBP believe that noise pollution is one of the biggest quality of life issues in neighborhoods, and the goal of the partnership is to provide data to back up the complaints.
SONYC P.I. Juan Bello is interviewed in an article for Popular Science covering scientists’ approaches to noise pollution. In the interview he discusses why noise is tricky to deal with because, unlike water or air pollution, it leaves no traces behind in the environment, meaning that when people complain about evening construction noise, it can take days for the city to send an inspector to the site—by which time, the noise has probably stopped. With sensors, he explains, “You can actually go back in time and locate occurrences that justify those complaints”.
Popular Science – These scientists think peace and quiet should be a human right
On Tuesday march 27th, SONYC presented at the US Ignite Application Summit, an event co-located with the Smart Cities Connect Conference and Expo.
