I have lived happily alongside Heathrow for 25 years, with little intrusion ( apart from Concorde) until June 2014. Since then, when the wind is in the east, my neighbourhood has been assaulted with noise, as new flightpaths are "tested" as part of a global initiative to supposedly reduce the cost of fuel for airlines, and, supposedly, reduce aircraft emissions. The changes have been implemented in the USA, and are being tested in the EU, without consultations with communities that will be changed forever by exposure to increased noise.
The methods used to calculate noise exposure are misleading in the extreme, with decibel monitors placed at strategic points, and noise levels averaged out as an annual exposure, rather than being stated as maximum and minimum decibel levels. My journal quilt this month is therefore about the noise contours around Heathrow, showing that my house is supposedly outside the noise contours, and that the 85dB sound levels going over our roof between 2130h and 2330h in particular, are a complete figment of my, and my neighbours' imaginations.
Commercial cotton, overprinted with hand-enhanced map, commercial ribbons, hand-quilted / embroidered and machine quilted.
And we could forgive Concorde!!! Love the journal!
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