Authors: Jacob Sampson, Joshua Goates, Brian Patchett, Abolfazl Amin, Bonnie Andersen
Mentors: Bonnie Andersen
Insitution: Utah Valley University
Noise from an interstate can reach extreme levels. The OSHA limit for when sound becomes dangerous for the health of individuals is 85 dB. At UVU there is a pedestrian bridge that goes over I-15 and the students and other pedestrians that use this bridge are exposed to sound levels that could be potentially dangerous for their hearing, along with other adverse health effects due to sound on a regular basis. Sound levels have been measured on the bridge using two different measuring devices. The first being an Extech noise dosimeter, that was worn on the shoulder of the measurer as they walked across the bridge. The second instrument used was a Larson David sound level meter. That was placed on several places along the length of the bridge at set to record for several minutes to get the sound levels at those places. Sound levels that have been recorded have ranged form 79 dB to 102 dB. The OSHA limit for occupational exposure at 100 dB is two hours while for non-occupational exposure it is only 15 minutes. This research seeks to better understand and quantify the noise exposure pedestrians experience on the bridge. Also this research hopes to find out what facts influence the sound levels on the bridge and we hope to compare our experimental results to an ANSYS model of the bridge to confirm our findings.