If you are heading into Manhattan off the George Washington Bridge, you can't miss the cluster of four 32-story apartment buildings built right over the interstate. 300,000 cars go whizzing underneath the buildings each day. This makes the bridge the nation’s busiest crossing.

Built in 1964, the Apartments were to be a shining monument to efforts in easing New York's chronic housing shortage. But almost immediately, the development was controversial; people worried that the exhaust from the traffic might be a health hazard to the residents.

Researchers began going floor-to-floor, checking on the well-being of school children who lived in the Apartments. Something was definitely going on. The kids living on the lower floors had lower reading scores than the children who lived on the buildings' higher floors. In fact, it was a linear relationship: the lower the floor of the child's apartment, the lower their reading scores.

But wait—further research showed it wasn't the exhaust pollution. It was noise pollution. The children in the lower levels were exposed to exponentially more traffic noise. All day, everyday, the kids heard the endless honking of horns, the screeching of brakes, and the continuous roar of hundreds of thousands of engines zooming by. Kids learned to block out all the sounds of traffic so well that they pretty much started to block out everything (even the good "noise").

None of these kids had hearing problems: all the kids had hearing tests, and they sailed right through. Cornell professor Gary Evans said that the answer is as simple as this: "The kids began to tune the noise out." The kids became too good at blocking noise, they tuned out all noise, including speech.

Trying to remedy the situation, the school installed some sound-absorbent panels at the ceiling. The paneling only reduced the volume by 5 dB. It was still awfully loud. But it was enough of a difference that the following year's preschoolers outperformed their predecessors. Their teachers reported that the kids were speaking in more complete sentences. They understood more of what was being spoken to them, and they were better understood by others.

But even with this research, it took until 2004 for the managers of the apartments to take action and install noise-minimizing double-pane glass windows.

Possible Preaching Angle:

This could be used as a good reminder of how much "good" can get lost in today's cacophony of “noise” of TikTok, social media, commercials, text messages, phone notifications, and the noise surrounding everyday life. We scarcely have any quiet times to meditate on God’s Word and to pray, or have a quiet conversation with a good friend.