Acoustic Research Laboratories, a company based in NSW, has developed a ‘noise camera’ for picking up vehicles that generate a lot of noise. You don’t need to be a brainiac to work out who will be its biggest customer.
The system uses a set of microphones and cameras to monitor and analyse sound activity. It drops background noise and scans whatever is left. The system attempts to identify the type of noise using a ‘trigger list’ and the volume of the source.
If the undesired sound is too loud, the system then takes a ten second video recording of the scene as evidence. The multiple microphones permit the system to triangulate the source of the sound, determining which vehicle in the footage is generating it.
The next step should be familiar to anyone who’s ever had a run-in with the other revenue raisers that are adorning our road networks.
Now I’d love to see how the government plans to justify these cameras. It’s bad enough watching them lie through their teeth about speed cameras being about ’safety’ and not ‘revenue raising’… no? What excuse are they going to use when these cameras start lining sections of road in the middle of nowhere?
The company claims that the system can store evidence for 10,000 infringements before the internal hard drive fills, but the system can send enough data back to a base station to generate an infringement notice immediately.
Ain’t technology grand?
The first trial of the system is in Mt Ousley, between Sydney and Wollongong. (A word of advice, if you’re in the area be careful.) Victoria and South Australia have also declared trials, but at the moment they’re configuring the systems to target trucks using compression braking in built-up areas.
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No offense to any riders out there, but what about certain motorbikes? Harley D’s for example. Most of these make even seriously modified cars sound like an eco friendly electric car…
Epic sigh. Getting beyond a joke right now..
At least, if nothing else, for every car fined that can actually benefit from a larger cat/turbo-back exhaust, a hundred riced out lancers with cheap autobarn fartcans welded on to the end of the standard drinking-straw sized exhaust system will get fined too…
this is great. They should install 2 on George St alone, 1 on Grande Parade at Brighton le sands and 1 inside the carpark of Stanmore maccas
hectic
LOL I’m glad QLD is absent from that list unless i can’t read.
as if hiding in the bush with a speed camera isn’t bad enough.
Bikes don’t even have cats and generally only have one muffler on a length of pipe, and so when those guys install straight pipes they get real loud.
I’ve got quite a few mates who ride, some of who run aftermarket exhausts, and whether its a 250cc or a 1000cc the things are stupidly loud.
They’ll just do the usual and, assuming these things are signposted, cover their rear plate.
…so, when is the police going to get on with it’s job, instead of chasing the $$$ ?
Surely it would be in conjunction with the EPA though, not the police.
Goddamn police are turning into the enemy now! WE pay these people to keep us safe! Absolutely disgusting the state of the police force these days, it is a complete embarrassment! they should all be ashamed.
P.s yeah i drive a Supra, and i got done for “excessive noise”, turned out my exhaust was 3 decibels over legal, had to spend a couple of hundred to put it back to stock!. 3 decibels?! for christ sakes!
Charlie… how do you propose we cover our plates? for one thing most peoples legs aren’t long enough to make it around that far, and secondly a lot of bikes are not equiped with tail pipes that are above the number plate, so unless you see people walking around with scorched legs there is pretty good chance most people won’t be attempting to “cover” their number plates. The only way around this would be to have a fender eliminator which are illegal in all states.
Lukey…
vehicle noise is regulated by police not EPA.
The holder for the rego sticker, that uses the same screw as the plate, tends to cover enough of it to be just fine.
The police will catch you, but depending on how they’re feeling they can call the EPA on you to check your emissions levels. I believe the police carry noise meters, but I’m not entirely sure.
I know that, in some police blitzes where they cordon off roads and check every car for defects, they’ll call the EPA to bring mobile equipment to check the cars.
Can we get a source on this article?
If your source is private, make clear the reputation of your source.
Thanks
Mount Ousley? As in the one that’s already been there for ages?
That’s for trucks Einstein.
+3dB is a doubling of the volume (…SPL strictly), it’s not insignificant at all.
I knew there were good reasons to move to Queensland. Hardly any speed cameras (and they are not disguised as Rav4’s or utes either)). And the cops actually get on with the job of catching crooks rather than harrassing young people about trvial exhaust noise crap. A relative (female) got hassled for driving a WRX and doing NOTHING wrong so they dobbed her in to the EPA using thier bull$hit noise cameras… Hope they are more acurate than those Western Ring road fixed jobs… The only way I’d go back to Melboure is in a Pine box…