On the diversity of urban waterscape

Jian Kang

In the last several hundred years the development of Sheffield has been shaped by waterways. In the recent city centre regeneration, starting in the 1990s, great efforts have been made to ensure that the reconnection with the rivers continues to be fostered and their role in the history of the city celebrated. Waterscapes and squares have been embedded into the city for its vibrancy with the respect of the history of Sheffield. This paper examines the soundscape with waterscape along the Gold Route formed in the city centre regeneration project. The changes of waterscape sound levels with frequency and time at different locations of the Gold Route are analysed. Comparisons have also been made between different water features along the Gold Route in terms of psychoacoustic parameters including loudness, roughness, sharpness, and fluctuation strength. A series of field questionnaire surveys in selected locations along the Gold Route have shown that water sounds are the most preferred sounds in the soundscape.

Mots clés: Soundscape; Urban; Water; Psychoacoustics

Domaines: Acoustique [physics.class-ph]

Jian Kang. On the diversity of urban waterscape. Acoustics 2012, Apr 2012, Nantes, France. ⟨hal-00811058⟩