The effect of noise on the comfort of passengers inside the tramway and its impact on traffic congestion in the urban area

The tramway is a mean of transport which is used frequently in many cities around the world, because it improves the offer of public transport through its important capacity of transporting. This may ameliorate the state of road traffic by reducing the number of vehicles along the tram line. Despite these advantages, there are some problems related to users’ comfort like the noise caused during the operation. This study is focused on the human perception of the noise levels detected inside the tramway. The objective of this work is to identify and analyze the level of noise detected inside tramway, to know in which cabin and section the high noise is recorded, to find the causes and to show if the measured noise influences the comfort of passengers. For that, noise measurements are taken in all cabs and along the tram line. The results show that the levels of noise inside the seven cabins is different. The high noise is detected in the motorized cabins and in many sections, like the curves and also in other sections. The results show also that this noise affects negatively on the comfort of passengers. Finally, different solutions that can contribute to reduce effectively the noise to make the tram more comfortable and efficient to relieve traffic congestion in urban areas are presented.