Can A Loud Restaurant Ruin A Good Meal? Here's Where A Few Louisville Restaurants Rank In The Noisy Trend
What is the advantage to a restaurant so loud that you can’t easily chat with your partner or maybe even hear yourself think? Maybe someone... The article discusses the topic of restaurant noise, which is often a constant element of dining out and can lead to a lack of enjoyment and conversation. The author notes that restaurants are so loud that diners can't easily communicate with their partners or even hear themselves. The article also discusses the science behind the loudest restaurant noise in the world, with a survey of 50 respondents expressing varying levels of anger and disappointment. Many refused to return to noisy eateries, while others expressed a desire to leave the premises due to the lack of privacy and noise interference. This article discusses how to reduce restaurant noise and how science can be applied to the issue. The noise level has been a topic of concern for diners since its inception in the past 10 or 12 years.
Publicerad : 10 månader sedan förbi Robin Garr i Lifestyle
What is the advantage to a restaurant so loud that you can’t easily chat with your partner or maybe even hear yourself think? Maybe someone out there finds this exciting and attractive, but I haven’t found anyone yet who’s a fan.
And yet, based on my own experience, talks with food-loving friends, and queries from readers, ear-shattering background noise is a near-constant element in dining out.
It’s not happening only in Louisville, either. Visitors returning from New York City speak of restaurants so thunderous that they make Louisville at Derby time seem tame. The Washington Post got a lot of attention in a June 2 article, why restaurants are so loud, and what science says we can do about it, delving deeply into the art and science of restaurant noise. To discover more, you can read the article at this paywall-free gift link.
Diners here need no instruction from elsewhere to push back. In a quick social-media crowd-sourcing survey, about 50 responses unanimously responded with varying degrees of anger and disappointment. Amid talk of negative reviews and talks with management, many said they refuse to ever return to a too-noisy eatery. A handful spoke of boxing their uneaten meal and departing the premises.
Restaurant noise has been a source of complaints for a long time, although when we think back to the bygone days of memorable local spots like Hasenour’s, the Old House, Casa Grisanti, and many more, we remember them as buzzy but not deafening.
Thinking back, it seems to me that noise inflation got serious in trendy Louisville eateries within the past 10 or 12 years. In 2012 I was startled when the roar at then-new Silver Dollar prompted a friend and me to text across the table because we could not hear each other.
A couple of years later, in a review headlined What? I can't heeeaaarrr you! I dinged the otherwise excellent new LouVino on Bardstown Road for near-unbearable noise:
“Okay, I know that noise is in. If you're looking for a quiet, romantic dinner venue in Louisville's trendy dining scene, I can point you to maybe three or four places where you'll probably be able to hear yourself think, provided you don't draw a set of neighbors who forgot to bring their indoor voices.
But hard edges and a happy crowd that packs the place nightly kicks LouVino up another volume notch, cranking it even beyond its Bardstown Road and NuLu neighbors. I whipped out my iThing's dBMeter app and took a quick reading: 92, peaking to 98.
Whoa! In other words, LouVino's ahm-bee-ahnce roars at the approximate level of a subway train, or a motorcycle revving up nearby."
Yes, it was that loud. It took a while, but as complaints grew I calibrated that iPhone app against a more serious scientific device, then began including a “Noise Level” report at the end of my reviews. A lot of you have thanked me for that.
And yet … where’s the fun in an eatery so silent that it feels like a tomb? Who wants a venue so quiet that everyone nearby can listen in on your private conversation with your date?
You would think that there’d be a ton of popular restaurants in the Goldilocks zone, a desirable setting where the scene is never too loud or too silent but always, like Baby Bear’s porridge, just right.
In the meantime, we try to cope. Ask for a table in a quiet corner or, weather permitting, dine outdoors. Look for a smaller room in a larger venue, or duck into a booth with a high back. Hit a busy place for lunch, not dinner, or even at an off hour. Text your friends, learn to lip read, focus on your food, and bring your sense of humor.
Just for fun, I went back through my records since I started recording noise levels to assemble this list of the loudest dining experiences I’ve noted since 2018, matched against standard sound comparisons for peak dB levels in the upper 70s, 80s and 90s.
90dB and over - Likely hearing damage at 8-hour exposure.
80dB and over - Possible hearing damage at 8-hour exposure.
Garbage disposal, dishwasher, average factory, freight train 50 feet away or a car wash at 20 feet (89dB)
Grassa Gramma, spring 2019
Average over 79dB with peaks barely under 90dB.
Propeller plane flyover at 1000 feet or a food blender up close (88dB)
70dB - Upper 70s are annoyingly loud to some people.
Ämnen: Food & Drink