Re: Motorcycle Noise - What about Tire Noise?

["David Staudacher" <quiet@xxxxxxx>]

On Thu, 04 Sep 1997 09:31:42 -0700, 
Christopher England   <cengland@earthlink.net> wrote:

>As for motorcycles, in Los Angeles there aren't many really.  I have not
>found that motorcycles are a significant source except in Europe...

   This comment puzzles me.  Do you mean tire noise from motorcycles 
isn't significant?  I know the big Honda's (Gold Wing?) and even the 
Electra-Glides are indeed very quiet, but my sense of the motorcycle 
problem is not with the tires, but with the straight pipes ("drag" 
pipes) that are installed in place of stock mufflers to deliberately 
make as much noise as possible and gain a little extra horsepower.
I haven't been to Los Angeles, but it's my impression that they are 
there in abundance, that city being home to the "Hell's Angels".  In 
almost every jurisdiction these pipes are illegal, but the laws are 
largely unenforced, even *unknown* by the police.  One Long Island 
town not long ago dared to enact a ban on such bikes and ended up 
retracting it after several biker clubs threatened to hold a rally 
there and challenged the police to enforce the law.  Personally, I'm 
deeply dissapointed that they backed down.  They couldn't have done 
much about the rally, of course, short of calling out the national 
gaurd, but after that they could have dealt with individual cases more 
easily, and the citizen outrage after such a rally would have given 
the police a lot of needed support.

   I live in a very quiet suburban neighborhood, but from my front 
yard I can hear these bikes roaring away from the stoplight at the 
nearest 4-lane intersection over a mile away.  The "circle of noise" 
from just one of these bikes easily takes in over two thousand front 
yards like mine.  There is no possible justification for any person  
to make *that* much noise for mere personal transportation.

David Staudacher - quiet@igc.org
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