Özet:

Environmental noise is a well-known source of pollution in urban areas that can be described as an undesirable sound. According to the findings of the World Health Organization (WHO), noise is the second largest environmental cause of health problems, just after the impact of air quality. The adverse effects of noise pollution on human health have been categorized under 6 groups by WHO: hearing impairment, sleep disturbance, social behavior (annoyance, anger, depression etc.), cognitive performance, cardiovascular and psychophysiological risks and work performance. Main sources of noise in urban areas include road, rail, and air traffic, industries, construction and public work and the neighborhood. Not all noise can be called noise pollution. In the context of main sources of noise in urban areas, traffic noise has become the most serious and common type of noise pollution. Bulent Angin Boulevard, which is the subject of the research, is one of the roads with heavy traffic in Adana. The research was executed in the pilot area extending to the 1 121 m route of Bulent Angin Boulevard and 112,07  ha area covering 500 m east and 500 m west of this route. In line with the aim of the research, the first step has been to map Bulent Angin Boulevard-induced environmental noise during daytime (07:oo-19:oo), evening time (19:oo-23:oo) and night time (23:oo-07:oo) by employing SoundPLAN 7.3 software. After that, traffic-induced noise distribution maps were analyzed by threshold values stipulated by the Regulation on Environmental Noise Assessment and Management that is compliance with the European Union Directive on Environmental Noise (2002/49/EC) and noise limits identified by WHO. As a result of the study, the adverse health effects of the road traffic noise in the research area were determined by 11 noise distribution maps and designated the ratio of population exposed to the noise. Three of these 11 maps were created according to Regulation on Environmental Noise Assessment and Management; eight of them were created according to noise limits identified by WHO (1 map for cognitive performance, 1 map for sleep disturbance, 3 maps for social behavior (annoyance, anger, depression etc) and 3 maps for cardiovascular and psychophysiological risks).

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