This article reports the two extensive aircraft noise annoyance surveys subsequently carried out among residents in the vicinity of Zurich Airport in 2001 and 2003 in order to update and validate existing exposure-effect relationships for aircraft noise and annoyance in Switzerland. Logistic and polynomial approximations of the exposure-annoyance relationships for both the years 2001 and 2003 are presented for the Ldn, Lden, and LA,eq24 noise metrics. The results confirm other recently published international research and provide further evidence that community annoyance due to aircraft noise has increased over the past decades. Between the two survey years, a considerable amount of early morning and late evening flight operations have been relocated to use an other runway than before; thus both the effects of a recent step decrease and recent step increase on the exposure-annoyance relationship could be investigated. Residents that experienced a step increase elicited a quite pronounced over-reaction of annoyance which correlated with the magnitude of the change. Two logistic regression models are provided to forecast the effects of changes in exposure during shoulder hours in the early morning and the late evening. The results confirm other recently published international research and provide further evidence that community annoyance due to aircraft noise has increased over the past decades. Between the two survey years, a considerable amount of early morning and late evening flight operations have been relocated to use an other runway than before; thus both the effects of a recent step decrease and recent step increase on the exposure-annoyance relationship could be investigated. Residents that experienced a step increase elicited a quite pronounced over-reaction of annoyance which correlated with the magnitude of the change. Two logistic regression models are provided to forecast the effects of changes in exposure during shoulder hours in the early morning and the late evening. Annoyance responses to stable and changing aircraft noise exposure

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The uncertainties of measured and calculated aircraft noise have been analyzed in a thesis at ETH Zurich. The thesis provides information and methods for estimating uncertainties, it shows possibilities for handling these uncertainties and it provides guidance to courts and administrative bodies on how to deal with such uncertainties in applying the legal noise limits. To estimate the uncertainties of calculation and measurement the Swiss aircraft noise calculation program FLULA2 and a lot of measured data has been analyzed. Using radar data it is possible to reach a standard uncertainty of the calculated Leq between 0.5 dB for daytime and 1.0 dB for night-time. The analyses also show that the uncertainty of measurements at automated stations is in the same order of magnitude like the calculations. Therefore the yearly calculated and measured aircraft noise shows no significant deviations. Furthermore with FLULA2 it is possible to stick an uncertainty on a confidence level of 90%. It is now up to administrative and legal bodies to set up rules on how to account for uncertainties of calculations in evaluating noise situations close to legal noise limits.

This article discusses aircraft noise effect assessment with noise effect indexes, such as have recently been developed for noise monitoring purposes at the airports of Zurich and Frankfurt. Aircraft noise indexesa re noise assessment instruments that express the overall effects of aircraft noise as as ingle figure which reflects the total amount of people that are in some waya ff ected by the noise of ap articular airport. By accounting for the most important effect measures (such as annoyance or awakening reactions)a nd by weighting these measures according to the population density at each grid point within adefined geographic perimeter,noise effect indexes provide residents and authorities with an integral picture of the total noise effect. The paper reviews basic features of noise effect indexesand reports about the development and the current practical application of such indexes. Moreover, it points to specificnot yet fully resolved issues such as accounting for the diurnal variation of noise effects, the definition of calculation perimeters, and the weighting of day and night effects including the question of unification of different effect measures into one index. an efficient measure to evaluate different operation modes of an airport as aw hole, or to survey the effectiveness of previously installed noise abatement measures as well as to monitor changes of the distribution of the noise burden around an airport'svicinity.Bye xpressing noise effect as number of people affected,theycan also be used as abasis for (financial)c ompensation schemes between different municipalities.In this paper,w ea )r eport on the basic features of noise effect indexes, b) reviewp reliminary experiences with such indexesastheyare applied in Zurich and Frankfurt, and c) point to current and future issues to tackle in order to enhance the indexes. Basic features of noise effect indexes Expressing noise impact as number of people affectedThe total noise impact an airport generates is depending on the operating plan enforced, type and number of airplanes, flight routing, time of day (orn ight)a nd many other factors. It is in the nature of things that such factors are oftentimes subject to public debate. Governments 1012 ©S.Hirzel Verlag · EAA Brink et al.:A ircraft noise indexes ACTA ACUSTICA UNITED WITH ACUSTICA Vol. 96 (2010)

This article reports on the Zurich Aircraft Noise Index(ZFI), anoise effect indexdescribing the integral effects of aircraft noise (annoyance and sleep disturbance)onthe population in the vicinity of Zurich airport, integrating the considered noise effects to as ingle number valid for the whole airport. In the year 2007 the ZFI became operational as an effect-oriented monitoring tool serving noise abatement policyinthe canton of Zurich, Switzerland. During its development, various exposure-response relationships and parameter settings were studied as a basis to establish the official calculation rule. The official calculation rule wasthen applied to atime series of 12 years, and reasons for changes in the ZFI were studied by means of sensitivity analyses, taking into account the air traffico perations and population development around Zurich airport in great detail. The article presents the concept and implementation of the ZFI,its development, its application, and insights obtained so far. Based on the obtained results, the potential and limitations of the indextoexpress the number of affected persons, its sensitivity to changes in population figures and air trafficaswell as the possibilities to separate different influencing parameters, and the scientificshortcomings of the indexare discussed.