Agency wrestles with Tahoe noise standards

Monday, Oct. 28, 1996 | 11:59 a.m.

Lake Tahoe's land-use regulator, the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency, TRPA is considering raising the limit of the amount of noise deemed acceptable within the forest to a more realistic level.

Noise is one of nine so-called environmental thresholds the agency has identified as a yardstick to measure the agency's success in protecting Lake Tahoe's environment. Others include water and air quality, wildlife, scenic quality and vegetation.

The bistate agency is in the midst of a five-year review of its success in meeting goals related to those thresholds. Coming from the effort will be identification of acceptable levels of growth between 1997 and 2007.

All in all, the Lake Tahoe area is a quieter place than when agency noise standards were last measured in 1991.

"There's a general progress," TRPA planner Rick Angelocci told the Reno Gazette-Journal. "Nothing's standing out as a glaring problem."

With few exceptions, planes landing at Lake Tahoe Airport are making noise within agency guidelines. Noise within the area's neighborhoods is also generally acceptable.

But when guidelines for measuring sound in wilderness and wildlife areas were established in 1982 maximum acceptable noise was identified at 25 decibels.

A human whisper, measured from 6 feet, is 40 decibels, Angelocci said. Many natural noises within the forest violate the agency's standard.

"A babbling brook can exceed that standard," he said.

And TRPA has set no specific noise limits for jet skis and other personal watercraft -- admittedly some of the noisier machines in use on the lake.

The agency is considering a number of possible regulations concerning watercraft, and noise limits likely will be in the mix.

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