(The following story by Jennifer Maloney appeared on the Newsday website on May 2.)
NEW YORK — Pull out the earplugs. The Long Island Rail Road is trying to make train horns a little less deafening.
Responding to complaints from Cedarhurst residents, the LIRR plans to test three new devices designed to reduce decibel levels on train horns.
The Federal Railroad Administration calls for sound levels between 96 and 110 decibels. The LIRR is now aiming to toot between 96 and 100.
The railroad’s first attempt at sound reduction — at a trial on March 8 in Cedarhurst — met limited success. That test involved metal plates, or baffles, installed next to the horns to block the sound.
That experiment reduced the sound level by about 4 decibels to between 105 and 106 decibels, LIRR spokeswoman Susan McGowan said.
“We all agreed that we wanted to see something more,” she said.
So the railroad’s engineers went back to the drawing board and ordered prototypes of three devices to be tested on different trains:
* A new horn with a narrower sound range than the one the LIRR now uses.
* A pressure regulator to lower air pressure passing through the existing horn.
* A choke mechanism to restrict air passing through the horn.
The LIRR has ordered four sets of each prototype and hopes to test them all in a one-day trial late this month or early June, McGowan said.
Eight LIRR trains still are equipped with the baffles tested in last month’s experiment, she added.
Cedarhurst residents had complained that the piercing noise of train horns cuts through the village’s densely packed apartment buildings and single-family homes. Some say they must sleep with earplugs. Others say they clap their hands over their ears every time a train passes.
Ninety-five decibels is about as loud as the rumbling and screeching on a subway platform; 100 decibels is as loud as a chain saw; and 110 decibels is as loud as a rock concert.