All four of the city’s sound monitoring display boards across Edmonton have been turned off following noise complaints from residents.
The City of Edmonton installed eight photo-radar style systems in some of the city’s noisy areas to detect vehicles being driven too loudly. Four of these stations had LED boards that displayed decibel levels. Two were turned off earlier this week. On Thursday, a City of Edmonton spokesperson confirmed all four had gone dark.
While the devices are still recording noise levels, the boards are no longer displaying noise information.
Some residents believed the boards had the opposite effect intended and the noise information attracted more drivers to rev up their engines.
"I thought people were just ‘Oh, I just want to see how loud I am in case I get fined’,” Stephanie Kierstead, who lives across the street from the Fort Rd. sound device explained.
A member of a local motorcycle club told CTV News Edmonton that members have used the system as ‘scoreboards’ to see whose engine was the loudest.
Mayor Don Iveson said Phase 2 of the pilot will include enforcement and believes the devices will have a positive community impact.
"I think the message will start to get through to people that this kind of anti-social and disrespectful behaviour with loud vehicles is not going to be tolerated anymore in our city,” said Iveson.
The pilot project ends in November.
