The Denver Department of Public Health and Environment has finalized updates to the city noise ordinance for the first time since Barack Obama became president, with a focus on the rapid development and growth of the city.
“Anybody that's lived in the City and County of Denver for any significant amount of time knows that our city doesn't look the way that it did almost two decades ago,” DDPHE noise program manager Brendan Doyle told a city council committee on February 5. “We recognize a need to balance the city's growth, the desire for activation and arts and entertainment and music events, while still holding true to our job at the public health department to protect citizens.”
The DDPHE began looking into a new noise ordinance in 2018 but didn’t finish before the department had to pivot to focus on the COVID-19 pandemic.
In 2022, the department picked up where it left off and began a public engagement period. Resident and city council feedback, along with research about noise ordinances in other cities, helped form the final recommendations, according to DDPHE.
“The noise ordinance is complex, there's nuance to it, there's passionate viewpoints on all sides,” Doyle said. “We believe that these proposals are measured in our approach, and we think that they strike the right balance. ...We also know that these proposals, by the way that this ordinance is structured, won't make everyone happy all of the time.”
Over the last two years, conflicts over pickleball players and residents who live near public courts, concerts and raves held in public and disagreements between bars and their neighbors have all focused on noise complaints.
In each case, city officials have admitted that Denver's noise laws aren’t perfect and they probably never will be in a big city — but they are optimistic that an overhaul will help.
The first major proposed change comes in the definition of noise, which currently regulates noise with “adverse psychological or physiological effects on human beings." The new definition would replace that clause with a provision that unwanted sound and sound that “exceeds the sound pressure levels permitted in this chapter or is otherwise prohibited” is disallowed.
According to Denver public health investigator Paul Riedesel, DDPHE wants to remove the "psychological effects" part, because its subjectivity has forced people to come testify about the psychological impacts of noise when sound was above legal limits; there were also complaints focusing on headaches from sound below noise limits, he says.
Denver Trash Pickup Time
The noise involved with trash pickup is one of the more contentious items in the proposal, which suggests a new start time at 6 a.m. instead of 7 a.m. under the proposed changes. However, four councilmembers said they hear complaints from constituents about disruptive trash pickup in the morning.“I have had people complain about dumpsters behind our homes, in shopping centers, being emptied right behind our homes as early as 5 or 6 in the morning, and I hate to go back to them and say, ‘We've solved the problem. We're now making it legal at six o'clock, so you don't have to complain anymore but you'll still hear it at six,’” councilmember Kevin Flynn said.
But waste hauling companies argued they need more time because alleyways get busy by 7 a.m., and there are conflicts with school pickup and drop-off in some cases.
“Some of the private waste haulers, they asked for a lot more than this, so we tried to come up with a happy medium,” Riedesel said. “Originally, the request was 4 a.m. for the inner city and 5 a.m. for the rest.”
Riedesel also cited the Waste No More initiative, which will require recycling and composting at commercial businesses and large events when it goes into effect “sometime in the near future,” as a reason even more time for waste hauling will be needed in the city. However, Nick Williams, serving as a representative for the Department of Transportation and Infrastructure (DOTI), said the city waste services schedule has no planned changes at this point.
Festivals and Special Events
Another emerging issue related to noise in Denver has been festivals and special events. Currently, only festivals and events on public property can receive a noise exemption up to 80 decibels, which caps at 10 p.m. Under the revision, properly permitted events on either public or private property could have noise up 85 decibels until 10 p.m.“To get this higher allowance level, it has to be open to the public,” Doyle said. “There can be sold tickets. It can be a free event, but even if it's held on private property, the public has to be given the opportunity to attend.”
Requiring that the public be allowed to attend was designed to combat worries that house parties would apply for event permits and exceed noise limits. Additionally, private properties could only hold noisy events for eight days in one year, and a single event can’t exceed four days. If an event is two days or longer, no noisy event could happen at that property lot or address for the next thirty, days according to the proposed rule changes.
Denver Construction Noise
Public health officials in Denver also want to change how complaints about construction noise are handled. Currently, DDPHE must go out and confirm a disturbance exceeds decibel limits to verify a complaint. But because construction is sporadic and uses different equipment at different times, the department has a hard time confirming violations. Under the changes, if someone takes a timestamped video of a plainly audible noise disturbance outside the allowed construction hours, DDPHE could issue a violation based on the video.
“We intend to enforce them as we do with waste stream activities or waste haulers,” Riedesel added.
When people apply for noise variances or specific exemptions to the ordinance for a certain time, they need approval from the Board of Public Health & Environment, which only meets once per month. However, DDPHE would like the department itself be allowed to approve certain construction noise variances rather than those requests having to wait for the board.
According to Riedesel, DDPHE has seen roadwork projects delayed or lose funding while waiting for board approval as the Colorado Department of Transportation requires some roadwork to occur overnight with closed roads, and Denver laws require construction noise end at 9 p.m on weekdays and 5 p.m. on weekends.
“We would require the exact same notifications, the same time frames with the variance requests,” Riedesel explained.
The city would still notify the council district involved and people or businesses within 200 feet of the proposed noise variance so those stakeholders could comment before the variance is approved or denied. Additionally, the city could still require hotel vouchers or other reparations for community members who might be impacted by a variance, which the DDPHE board can now.
When Residential and Business Noise Clash
The last major proposed change comes in rules for preexisting noise. “As the city develops and residential moves in next to industrial, or somebody puts a commercial establishment next to right up to residential housing and stuff, what we're looking at is who came first,” Riedesel said. “We aren't looking at the zoning.”
Current rules in these in this noise clashes refer to zoning in the area, but the department would instead like to determine what noise regulations should be used on a grandfathering basis. Riedesel said almost every zoning type in Denver allows residential uses, so looking at zoning designations wasn’t always helpful.
If an apartment building was built next to a preexisting concrete plant, the industrial noise limits would apply. Conversely, if a concrete plant was built next to an existing apartment building, the residential noise limits would apply.
Vehicles and Snow Removal
Minor changes to the ordinance include banning engine compression, or “Jake” brakes, which DDPHE presenters said come into use for construction and have caused several complaints in districts along interstates, according to some councilmembers. Changes would also require mufflers from motorcycles made before 1982.Additionally, DDPHE proposed a change to allow snow removal noise at any time that snow removal is required by DOTI rather than within certain timeframes. The ordinance would follow DOTI’s rules, which currently require snow to be removed 24 hours after a storm ends for residential properties and four hours after a storm ends for commercial properties.
If people want to conduct additional removal after those time frames, the new ordinance stipulates they could only do so between 7 a.m. and 10 p.m.
Though council members had a few questions, everyone on the committee voted to move the proposal to the full council, which will hear the proposed changes in the coming weeks.
