<div dir="auto">Thank you Brian. Words of wisdom. I'm so thankful for the work that we do.<div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">Best regards, Angela Daniel</div></div><br><div class="gmail_quote"><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Wed, Aug 3, 2022, 3:54 AM Brian Buhrow via AutonomousVehicles <<a href="mailto:autonomousvehicles@nfbnet.org">autonomousvehicles@nfbnet.org</a>> wrote:<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"> hello. At first, this message might seem off topic for this list, but autonomous vehicles<br>
and quiet cars go hand in hand by virtue of the fact that it is expected that autonomous vehicles<br>
will deploy many<br>
of the same propulsion technologies hybrid and electric cars do, thus making them quiet cars on<br>
our streets and highways. <br>
<br>
The article below, link and text included, tells the story of the Pedestrian Safety Enhancement<br>
Act, including the NFB's part in that story. Many of us spent many years working to get that<br>
legislation passed and the regulations which implement it written. It is work we should be<br>
proud of and for those folks who have come to the NFB since the bulk of this work was done,<br>
they should know about our involvement in this very important component of our ability to<br>
travel safely on our streets amidst these electric vehicles. Work like this is why I am a<br>
Federationist and why our work is so important to the lives of blind people. Sometimes what we<br>
do affects only a few blind folks, and sometimes it affects many, including those who are not<br>
blind. I'm proud of both the big and small things we do, but I want to make sure everyone<br>
knows about the big ones so we don't forget they exist.<br>
<br>
-Brian<br>
<br>
<br>
<a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/08/08/what-should-a-nine-thousand-pound-electric-vehicle-sound-like?campaign_id=4&emc=edit_dk_20220802&instance_id=68225&nl=dealbook®i_id=27757237&segment_id=100212&te=1&user_id=cfbe3c49635d1550df5aa13245dda31d" rel="noreferrer noreferrer" target="_blank">https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/08/08/what-should-a-nine-thousand-pound-electric-vehicle-sound-like?campaign_id=4&emc=edit_dk_20220802&instance_id=68225&nl=dealbook®i_id=27757237&segment_id=100212&te=1&user_id=cfbe3c49635d1550df5aa13245dda31d</a><br>
<br>
Annals of Sound<br>
August 8, 2022 Issue<br>
<br>
What Should a Nine-Thousand-Pound Electric Vehicle Sound Like?<br>
<br>
E.V.s are virtually silent, so acoustic designers are creating alerts for them. A<br>
symphony--or a cacophony--of car noise could be coming to city streets.<br>
<br>
By John Seabrook<br>
<br>
August 1, 2022<br>
<br>
I sleep on the second floor, in a bedroom facing a residential street in Brooklyn. Through<br>
the years, my sleeping brain has grown used to the nighttime noises of motor vehicles:<br>
mainly the growls of engines, but also the squeaks of truck springs wheezing over the<br>
street's speed hump, and the wheedling of open-door chimes from late-night Uber drop-offs.<br>
<br>
Fire engines, cop cars, unmuffled Harley-Davidson motorcycles, not to mention unhappy<br>
couples arguing and the occasional lost soul screaming at ghosts--none of that noise<br>
bothers me. On my first night in the country, however, I'm like Joe Pesci in "My Cousin<br>
Vinny," trying to sleep in rural Alabama: "What the fuck is that?"<br>
<br>
Unlike vision, smell, and taste, all of which dim when consciousness shuts down for the<br>
night, hearing is a 24/7 operation. For early humans, who were trying to rest outdoors with<br>
predators around, this trait was presumably a lifesaver. For people trying to sleep in the<br>
city that never does, though, all-night listening is mostly a liability. The brain must<br>
disregard a lot of ordinary metropolitan white noise, while remaining alert to unusual<br>
sounds that might be of vital importance. The waking brain performs a similar filtering<br>
function in the urban soundscape, ignoring as many of the meaningless noises as possible.<br>
<br>
Researchers into the neurobiology of hearing explain this phenomenon in terms of novelty<br>
and adaptation. Familiar and regularly patterned sounds, such as internal-combustion<br>
engines and air-conditioners, don't wake us; a new or irregular disturbance stands out, at<br>
least at first, amid the sonic clutter. In a 2005 paper, Ellen Covey, a psychologist at the<br>
University of Washington, and her co-authors identified these subconscious arbiters of<br>
sound and noise as the brain's "novelty detector neurons."<br>
<br>
But a novel or useful alert can become a meaningless repetitive noise over time. The<br>
beeping emitted by the new Walk / Don't Walk signals, which were recently installed on the<br>
corners of my block, initially struck me as abrasive; now I tune it out. Other, more<br>
aggressive sounds, such as back-up beepers on trucks, have been designed to resist<br>
assimilation, because that would diminish their efficacy as audible beacons. Far from<br>
blending together into a kind of acoustic ecosystem, city noises tend to compete with one<br>
another to be heard--an auditory cage match wherein the loudest sound eventually wins.<br>
<br>
The electrification of mobility presents humanity with a rare opportunity to reimagine the<br>
way cities might sound. Electric motorcycles, cars, trucks, and vans are legally mandated<br>
to replace all internal-combustion-engine (I.C.E.) vehicles in New York, L.A., and other<br>
cities by mid-century--a shift that will profoundly alter the acoustic texture of urban<br>
life. The internal-combustion engine, in addition to being the single largest source of<br>
CO[2] emissions, is the leading cause of global noise pollution, which studies have shown<br>
to have a similarly corrosive effect on human health. When moving at higher speeds,<br>
electric vehicles, or E.V.s, produce roughly the same wind and road noise that I.C.E.<br>
vehicles do, but at lower speeds they operate in near-silence: electricity flows from the<br>
battery to the motor, which spins with a barely audible hum. Therein lie the promise and<br>
the peril of E.V.s for city dwellers.<br>
<br>
A zero-emissions vehicle has obvious benefits for the environment, but a quiet car is a<br>
mixed blessing for the public good. Automobile engines, however annoying non-driving<br>
citizens find them, are rich in information, providing a protective web of sound that<br>
cushions us from collisions as we navigate the streets. Not only does engine noise announce<br>
a vehicle's presence; it can also convey its direction, its speed, and whether it is<br>
accelerating or decelerating. The same disturbances that my brain ignores while I'm<br>
sleeping help guide me when I'm cycling in traffic and can't take my eyes off the road to<br>
glance back. And, for pedestrians distracted by their phones, engine sounds are everyday<br>
lifesavers, as the tiger's distant roar was for napping early humans. Except that the<br>
predators are motor vehicles--and the new ones are virtually silent.<br>
<br>
In response to this threat, Congress passed the 2010 Pedestrian Safety Enhancement Act, a<br>
law that few Americans paid attention to at the time, and that took almost ten years to<br>
implement. As a result of the legislation, every E.V. and hybrid manufactured since 2020<br>
and sold in the U.S. must come equipped with a pedestrian-warning system, also known as an<br>
acoustic vehicle alerting system (AVAS), which emits noises from external speakers when the<br>
car is travelling below eighteen and a half miles per hour. (Similar regulations apply in<br>
Europe and Asia.)<br>
<br>
Automakers have enlisted musicians and composers to assist in crafting pleasing and<br>
proprietary alert systems, as well as in-cabin chimes and tones. Hans Zimmer, the film<br>
composer, was involved in scoring branded sounds for BMW's Vision M Next car. The<br>
Volkswagen ID.3's sound was created by Leslie Mándoki, a German-Hungarian<br>
prog-rock/jazz-adjacent producer. The Atlanta-based electronic musician Richard Devine was<br>
brought in to help in making the Jaguar I-Pace's voltaic purr. Some automakers cooked up<br>
sounds entirely in-house. The Porsche Taycan Turbo S has one of the boldest alerts: you're<br>
in Dr. Frankenstein's lab as he flips the switch to animate the monster. Engineers in the<br>
Audi Sound Lab made the lower frequencies of the Audi E-Tron GT Quattro's alert by<br>
algorithmically mixing different tones produced by recording an electric fan through a long<br>
metal pipe; the full alert references the sumptuous soundscapes of the film "Tron" and its<br>
sequel.<br>
<br>
Other alerts tilt more toward nature. Danni Venne, the head designer behind the Nissan<br>
Leaf's Canto sound palette, said in a Business Insider video that "you really have to go<br>
for instruments that don't have a hard attack to them. Wind instruments, flutes, oboes,<br>
clarinets . . . can kind of waver a bit." Elon Musk has suggested that Teslas could make<br>
goat noises, or, perhaps, clopping-coconut sounds, like those made by the crusaders in<br>
"Monty Python and the Holy Grail" because they lack actual steeds.<br>
<br>
Only one in twenty new cars sold in the U.S. is an E.V., so these alerts are still a rarity<br>
in New York, but one day everyone will live with them. I'm already wondering how I'm going<br>
to sleep.<br>
<br>
It took a lot of effort to make naturally quiet vehicles noisier. The campaign that led to<br>
the Pedestrian Safety Enhancement Act began at the grassroots level. One November morning<br>
in 2003, a friend dropped by the Illinois home of Deborah Kent Stein, a blind writer and an<br>
activist with the National Federation of the Blind, or N.F.B. The friend wanted to show<br>
Stein and her family his new Toyota Prius, a hybrid vehicle. "It's completely silent when<br>
it's running on its battery," he announced. "No kidding--you can't hear a thing."<br>
<br>
Stein later described this fateful encounter with the automotive future in an essay she<br>
published on the N.F.B.'s Web site:<br>
<br>
Two men in togas walk through Pompeii as Mount Vesuvius erupts<br>
"I'm really trying not to freak out about every little cataclysm."<br>
*<br>
*<br>
*<br>
*<br>
<br>
Cartoon by Lars Kenseth<br>
<br>
I stood at the curb and listened as our friend climbed into the driver's seat and slammed<br>
the door. I waited to hear the Prius hum into life and move forward. I heard the chatter of<br>
sparrows; the distant roar of a leaf blower; and, after a minute or two, the opening of the<br>
car door.<br>
<br>
"When are you going to start?" I asked.<br>
<br>
"I did start," our friend answered. "I drove down to the end of the block, and then I<br>
backed past you and drove up in front of you again." I felt a cold sense of dread. I<br>
thought, we've got a real problem.<br>
<br>
A few years later, Lawrence D. Rosenblum, a professor of psychology at the University of<br>
California, Riverside, read something about the danger of quiet cars. He had done acoustic<br>
research showing that the brain pays special attention to sounds moving toward the<br>
listener, automatically calculating what Rosenblum calls "time-to-arrival." He published an<br>
account of his work in a 2010 book, "See What I'm Saying: The Extraordinary Powers of Our<br>
Five Senses."<br>
<br>
With a grant from the N.F.B., Rosenblum set up an experiment in which blindfolded subjects<br>
stood next to a roadway and listened as both a gas-powered Honda Civic and a hybrid Prius<br>
running on its battery drove past. Subjects were told to press buttons on a device to<br>
indicate when they could hear a vehicle and to identify its direction. The results,<br>
Rosenblum told me, "couldn't have been clearer. People could hear the Honda when it was<br>
still twenty feet away, whereas they couldn't hear the Prius until it had passed them."<br>
<br>
At its headquarters, in Baltimore, the N.F.B. established a committee to investigate the<br>
problem of quiet cars. Discussions were held with automotive regulators and auto-industry<br>
engineers. "Smart" solutions were proposed involving sensors, cameras, and in-cabin alerts<br>
that would warn an E.V.'s driver of an impending collision. The sonic plague of back-up<br>
beepers unleashed by Ed Peterson's mid-sixties invention, the Bac-A-Larm, has been tempered<br>
by back-up cameras in newer trucks and vans, which warn only the driver, and not the rest<br>
of the street, if someone is behind the vehicle. Couldn't E.V. alert systems work<br>
similarly, especially with the proliferation of sensors and cameras in the latest models?<br>
But the blind community strongly opposed that approach, in part because it was predicated<br>
on an imminent collision, rather than on preventing such incidents from occurring in the<br>
first place.<br>
<br>
At one meeting, an automotive engineer made a suggestion. Since maximum-noise laws for<br>
gas-powered automobiles already existed, why not establish a minimum-noise standard that<br>
E.V.s had to meet? "It was a revolutionary idea," Stein wrote.<br>
<br>
But, in order to convince Congress to consider a law requiring a minimum-noise standard,<br>
the N.F.B. needed data. And in the nineties and early two-thousands, with so few hybrids<br>
and E.V.s on the road, the number of accidents involving pedestrians, visually impaired or<br>
not, was statistically negligible. The N.F.B. did collect many anecdotal reports about<br>
close calls, and even accounts of minor injuries. "But anecdotal evidence isn't statistical<br>
engineering evidence," John Paré, the N.F.B.'s executive director for advocacy and policy,<br>
who served as the national coördinator of the campaign against quiet cars, told me.<br>
<br>
Without real-world data proving that quiet cars could be dangerous, the National Highway<br>
Traffic Safety Administration, the federal agency charged with reducing deaths, injuries,<br>
and economic losses on the nation's roadways, could do nothing. The breakthrough came later<br>
in the decade, when the N.H.T.S.A. investigated crash rates for hybrids and E.V.s in<br>
incidents involving sighted pedestrians and cyclists, and compared those with crash rates<br>
for I.C.E. vehicles in similar incidents. The results, which were published in a 2009<br>
report, based on limited data from 2000 to 2007, showed that hybrids and E.V.s were twice<br>
as likely as I.C.E. vehicles to be involved in accidents with pedestrians. A follow-up<br>
report in October, 2011, using a larger sample size, found that hybrids and E.V.s had a<br>
thirty-five per cent greater likelihood of accidents with pedestrians, and a fifty per cent<br>
greater likelihood of accidents with cyclists. Most of these incidents occurred not on the<br>
road but in parking lots and driveways, when a driver was reversing or turning.<br>
<br>
The Pedestrian Safety Enhancement Act, calling for a "sound or set of sounds for all<br>
vehicles of the same make and model," was passed in the last hours of the 111th Congress,<br>
and President Barack Obama signed it into law on January 4, 2011. The Act did not specify<br>
what those alerts should sound like. That question took six years for the N.H.T.S.A. to<br>
resolve, and resulted in three hundred and seventy-two pages of mostly numerical acoustic<br>
rules and parameters. What took so long?<br>
<br>
"We thought that they had to sound to some degree like cars--otherwise, the alerts won't<br>
provide safety," Paré told me. "Society has already been trained to know what cars sound<br>
like." However, he added, "it's really hard to specify what a car sounds like. How do you<br>
put into regulatory legal language that a car should sound like a car?"<br>
<br>
Many electrical appliances make sounds, although few are scored by famous composers. My<br>
family's seven-piece kitchen ensemble, for example--dishwasher, electric oven, microwave,<br>
refrigerator and freezer, electric kettle, and coffee maker--creates a discordant symphony<br>
of simple beeps, tones, and chimes of clashing frequencies and rhythms throughout the day<br>
to inform us when the machines have begun or completed the particular tasks they were<br>
designed for. An acoustic ecosystem it's not.<br>
<br>
Electric vehicles offer a vast new stage for sound designers, both inside and outside the<br>
vehicles. As sensors, computer vision, and cloud-based algorithms take over more and more<br>
of the driving, sound will become a user's primary interface with such machines. If a car<br>
can drive, its user won't need to look up from her book or wake from a nap unless there's<br>
an audible alert. Many newer cars, outfitted with semi-autonomous features that assist a<br>
driver in adjusting the speed or changing lanes, already make in-cabin sounds when they<br>
perform these actions, mainly to reassure the driver and any passengers that the vehicle is<br>
executing a plan, and not just randomly drifting. (In psychoacoustic research, these are<br>
known as "priming" sounds.) There are also more urgent collision-avoidance alerts, should a<br>
car's cameras or sensors detect objects close by.<br>
<br>
Nicolas Misdariis is the head of the Sound Perception and Design group at the Institute for<br>
Research and Coordination in Acoustics/Music (IRCAM), in Paris, a world center of<br>
psychoacoustic research. Since 2008, his team has worked with the Renault Group, designing<br>
sounds for the French automaker's lineup of electric cars, both prototypes and vehicles in<br>
production.<br>
<br>
IRCAM's office is next to the Pompidou Center, in Paris's Fourth Arrondissement, and as I<br>
walked there one day in February to visit Misdariis I kept mostly to the streets, because<br>
the narrow sidewalks were overflowing with pedestrians and electric-scooter riders. I<br>
listened to the whine of diesel-fuelled cars and the whokada-whokada of two-stroke mopeds<br>
behind me--engines that give European cities a different audible flavor from American urban<br>
environments--in order to know when to get out of the way. The only close calls I had were<br>
with the shareable e-bikes that Paris, like New York, has embraced since the pandemic.<br>
E-bikes are not legally required to emit sounds when moving--yet--although some proactively<br>
do.<br>
<br>
When the researchers first began working with Renault, Misdariis told me, the collaborators<br>
struggled to find a common language in which to talk about acoustic design. "When a graphic<br>
designer says to you, `This is a red triangle,' there is no different interpretation<br>
possible," he said. "But if you say, `I would like a warm sound'--what is a warm sound?<br>
What is a round sound? What is a rough sound? A green sound? What is a smiling sound? We<br>
know what happy music is, but what is a two-second sound that is happy?" Misdariis added,<br>
"It is the sound designer's job to translate high-level visual representations into sound<br>
parameters--this is a very tricky point of our discipline." The Renault team eventually<br>
developed tools for visually sketching sounds, frequencies, and modulations. "We needed<br>
these tools to create efficient sound design," he said.<br>
<br>
The IRCAM researchers also investigated fundamental issues such as whether E.V. sounds<br>
should be sonic metaphors for the noise of internal combustion, similar to a cell phone's<br>
synthetic bell or the reassuring paper-crumpling that indicates you've discarded a document<br>
on your MacBook--a form of acoustic design known as skeuomorphism. Another option was to<br>
use "ear-cons"--audible symbols, such as the abstract clicks a Geiger counter makes, which<br>
everyone recognizes as the sign of radioactivity. Misdariis's team developed and tested<br>
options in both categories. They discovered, he said, that "metaphors are easy to<br>
understand but hard to remember, whereas symbols are harder to understand but easier to<br>
imprint."<br>
<br>
The IRCAM team worked with Andrea Cera, an Italian music producer and composer. Cera said<br>
that he views the electrification of mobility as a chance to fundamentally rethink the<br>
chaotic acoustics of a city. He envisions an urban soundscape modelled on birdsong in<br>
nature, in which, instead of competing to be heard, different sounds fit into an over-all<br>
acoustic ecosystem. By analyzing soundscapes around the world, Cera told me, he has<br>
identified "these little niches where you could put a little sound so that you could be<br>
present without being loud. Just a tone, not a melody." The sounds he and the IRCAM team<br>
have designed for Renault aim to complement those niches. He added, "If the soundscape is<br>
very chaotic--cars, phones, horns, radios--the best way to be noticed is to be still."<br>
<br>
IRCAM's Renault sounds were, indeed, surprisingly mellow, although perhaps less like<br>
birdsong than like a washing machine set to the delicates cycle. The Parisian soundscape<br>
will surely benefit from them. But would anyone hear these élégantes French alerts in New<br>
York, particularly over the bedlam and blare of all the gas-powered vehicles in its<br>
traffic-clogged streets?<br>
<br>
An automobile powered by internal combustion makes a racket. The induction of air, its<br>
compression inside the piston sleeves, the explosion of the vaporized gasoline, and the<br>
expulsion of CO[2] exhaust ("suck, squeeze, bang, and blow," in car talk) produce loud,<br>
low-frequency reports, rumbles, and vibrations.<br>
<br>
At General Motors, engineers in the Noise and Vibration Center are responsible for<br>
fine-tuning that din. Douglas Moore, a senior expert in exterior noise at G.M., started<br>
working at the company in 1984, when he was still an undergraduate at Michigan State. He<br>
has spent all but eight years of his career with G.M., where his job, and that of his Noise<br>
and Vibration colleagues, has been to silence, dampen, and modulate the sounds made by<br>
internal combustion, depending on the brand. Traditionally, when tuning a Cadillac, Moore<br>
and his colleagues would try to make the engine as quiet as possible, because quiet<br>
signifies luxury to the classic Cadillac buyer. In tuning a Corvette, Chevrolet's "muscle<br>
car," on the other hand, the engineers want some of the bang-bang-bang of internal<br>
combustion to come through, because that conveys power to the driver.<br>
<br>
The engine's sound isn't the only thing that the engineers work on. Many prospective<br>
buyers' first experience of a car or a truck is the CLICK ker-CHUNK that the driver's-side<br>
door makes when they close it, followed by a faint harmonic shiver given off by the<br>
vehicle's metal skin. The door's weight, latches, and seals are carefully calibrated to<br>
create a psychoacoustic experience that conveys comfort, safety, and manufacturing<br>
expertise.<br>
<br>
In designing electric versions of popular brands, U.S. automakers have to decide whether to<br>
make the E.V.s mimic their gas-driven counterparts or whether, like Renault, to divert from<br>
the familiar sound. The Passenger Safety Enhancement Act directives allow automakers to<br>
craft their own branded alerts, so long as they meet certain specifications.<br>
<br>
Moore's first E.V. project was the 2012 Chevy Volt, which emitted a pedestrian alert years<br>
before the law required one--a vacuum-cleaner-like hum that increased in frequency as the<br>
car sped up. "I have new colors to paint with," Moore said. "Instead of a palette of<br>
internal-combustion sounds, I have a palette of AVAS sounds. But it's the same approach.<br>
Now, instead of generating them with the physical components of the car, which has its pros<br>
and cons, we're generating them electronically."<br>
<br>
Moore is also the longtime chair of a group within the Society of Automotive Engineers<br>
called the Light Vehicle Exterior Sound Level Standards Committee, which helps develop<br>
tests that regulators use to measure safety on the road in the U.S. His group led the<br>
investigation into developing minimum-sound standards for E.V.s and hybrids, and<br>
establishing parameters to govern the decibel level, pitch, and morphology of the warning<br>
signals. Moore once came to the N.F.B. headquarters and tried navigating in traffic when<br>
blindfolded. His N.F.B. instructor was impressed that the engineer could identify a 2005<br>
Chevrolet Camaro and a 2009 Cadillac Escalade by their distinctive engine sounds.<br>
<br>
Moore explained the S.A.E.'s relationship with federal highway-safety regulators by saying,<br>
"We figure out how to measure things. N.H.T.S.A. says how much." I asked Moore why the<br>
regulations don't require that E.V.s more closely resemble I.C.E. vehicles, since, as the<br>
N.F.B.'s John Paré had noted to me, we're already used to those noises. Moore replied, "The<br>
purpose of this sound is to provide information about what the vehicle is doing. And<br>
there's more than one way to provide that." He paused. "Yes, we've learned<br>
internal-combustion sounds over a hundred years," he continued. "But before cars were<br>
around we knew that the clip-clop of horses meant the wagon was coming. So, there's nothing<br>
inherent in those engine sounds."<br>
<br>
Lobster arguing its case as its pulled out of tank<br>
"But I'm one of the cool ones!"<br>
Cartoon by Suerynn Lee<br>
<br>
A well-designed alert reaches the people who need to hear it, without annoying those who<br>
don't. To thread this sonic needle, engineers can vary a particular sound's decibel level,<br>
which indicates the volume of air pressure that the sound waves displace, and they can also<br>
adjust the sound's pitch, or frequency. Both decibel level and pitch determine the<br>
intrusiveness of that sound. The danger is that you create a sound that cries wolf, as it<br>
were: it works at first, but after a while people tune it out, so you have to pump up the<br>
volume.<br>
<br>
Although humans are capable of hearing frequencies between twenty and twenty thousand<br>
hertz, we hear in "octave bands," in which the highest frequency is double the lowest one.<br>
(In a musical C octave, the high C is twice the frequency of the low C.) The regulations<br>
specify that AVAS sounds must cover four separate, nonadjacent octave bands. A so-called<br>
broadband sound of this type, such as the staticky squawk that Amazon delivery vans<br>
recently began making when reversing, is less piercing, more robust, and easier for the<br>
hearer to locate directionally than an alert that occupies a narrow frequency range, such<br>
as the back-up beepers on Con Ed trucks. Not incidentally, the nonadjacent-octave-band rule<br>
precludes using a musical phrase as an alert--the pitch-shifting would sound awful--as well<br>
as any vocal alerts, human or animal. How would the blind tell the street from the sidewalk<br>
if electric cars spoke or barked?<br>
<br>
By permitting automakers the latitude to brand their alerts, the N.H.T.S.A. rules have<br>
created a new design form: acoustic automobile styling. Pedestrians and cyclists won't just<br>
hear the vehicle coming; they'll know what kind of car it is. For acoustic designers, both<br>
the pedestrian alerts of E.V.s and their rich in-cabin menus of sonic information represent<br>
the dawn of a new age. "I feel fortunate that I get to work on features that will influence<br>
the way the world will sound," Jigar Kapadia, the creative-sound director for General<br>
Motors, told me.<br>
<br>
Kapadia, who studied electronics and telecommunications engineering at Mumbai University<br>
and has a master's in music technology from N.Y.U., collaborates with Moore and others at<br>
G.M.'s sound lab in Milford, Michigan. For each sound, the team comes up with about two<br>
hundred variations and then tests them on their colleagues in the jury room, until they<br>
have arrived at a few finalists they can road test on vehicles.<br>
<br>
Kapadia likens an alert-system sound to a perfume. "Just like a perfume, it unfolds," he<br>
told me. "The alert has a base note, a middle note, and a top note." He added, "These<br>
layers are amalgamated together to bring out a cohesive organic sound, or a futuristic<br>
sound, based on what kind of brand we are focussing on." He noted that the pedestrian alert<br>
on the 2023 Cadillac Lyriq, the first electric version of G.M.'s long-standing luxury car,<br>
was made with a didgeridoo, an ancient Australian wind instrument that is based on the<br>
musical interval known as a perfect fifth. However, for G.M.'s nine-thousand-pound electric<br>
Hummer, which recently went on sale, Kapadia said, "we wanted a more distorted sound." He<br>
paused, and then added, "A bold Hummer sound." The Hummer's forward-motion alert made me<br>
think of church, when the organist launches into the next hymn. The back-up sound is<br>
something like its dystopian twin.<br>
<br>
At the Ford Motor Company, in order to find out what car buyers thought electric vehicles<br>
should sound like, engineers and consultants conducted "customer clinics" and launched a<br>
Facebook campaign. Judging from the number of responses, Ford fans were keen to make their<br>
opinions known. My own survey, largely based on reading comments under YouTube videos of<br>
various branded E.V. sounds, is that most people think that E.V.s should not resemble<br>
I.C.E. cars. Higher frequencies are thought to signify clean energy and software-driven<br>
intelligence; E.V.s ought to whoosh and zoom like the flying personal vehicles of<br>
science-fiction films such as "The Fifth Element," "Gattaca," "Blade Runner," and, of<br>
course, "Star Wars." In many cases, in fact, Foley artists created those futuristic<br>
vehicles' sound effects from recorded I.C.E. noise. In Ridley Scott's "Blade Runner 2049,"<br>
the twist is that Ryan Gosling's flying vehicle sounds like a broken-down I.C.E. jalopy.<br>
<br>
Ford's Brian Schabel, a sound engineer who, like Moore at G.M., has spent his career in<br>
Noise and Vibration, was part of the group that worked on the Mustang Mach E, Ford's sporty<br>
but practical electric S.U.V. "We knew we wanted to keep some aspect of that low-frequency<br>
modulation and link it to the past," he told me. "And then we looked at everything out<br>
there. Machinery--what do people associate powerful electric motors with? Formula E<br>
vehicles are very high-pitched, raw-sounding. How can we blend those two pieces together?<br>
We didn't want something that was too `Batman' or `Blade Runner.' " Mach E's forward sound<br>
put me in mind of a hovering dragonfly. The back-up sound is like a broadband cricket.<br>
<br>
In creating the company's new palette, Ford collaborated with Listen, an audio-branding<br>
firm based in Brooklyn. One member of the Listen agency, Connor Moore (no relation to<br>
Douglas), is the founder of CMoore Sound, and has worked with Google on Firefly, its<br>
self-driving-car project, as well as with Tesla, Lucid, Uber, and other tech companies. An<br>
electronic musician, Moore explained that he uses the same process and production tools for<br>
cars that he relies on to make music, mixing synthetic tracks with recordings of physical<br>
objects and nature sounds.<br>
<br>
"With the F-150 Lightning," Moore said, discussing the electric model of Ford's immensely<br>
popular pickup, "you're thinking about the size and the scale of the car. So some of that<br>
means recording heavy objects: metals, stone, things that have weight. You want something<br>
with low-end distortion that hits you in the chest. We also worked with more organic<br>
elements, like wind and water sounds, and clay and wood. We really leaned on a lot of the<br>
organic material for the in-car alerts."<br>
<br>
I asked Moore about the possibility that, by allowing for a unique identity for each of the<br>
sixty major auto brands in the world, we were setting ourselves up for a sonic<br>
catastrophe--a cacophony of competing thrums and whirs and chimes and tones. If every car<br>
is emitting a unique branded alert as it passes under my bedroom window, aren't my novelty<br>
detectors going to go haywire? I described my street to Moore, noting that there is a<br>
traffic light about twenty yards away, where there are often six or eight cars waiting.<br>
Once the cars are all E.V.s, will I need to move to an apartment at the top of the nearby<br>
ninety-three-story Brooklyn Tower just to get some sleep?<br>
<br>
Moore replied, "I think with intentional-design thinking we can actually, maybe, make the<br>
world quieter. That's my goal." However, he added, "we could wake up in five years with<br>
eighty per cent E.V.s, and it's a cacophony of sound and dissonance if these cars are all<br>
singing different tunes, in different key signatures and pitches." Moore speculated that<br>
cities might one day have to designate a particular key for all the alerts made in their<br>
streets. (I nominate F-sharp major, the key of Jay-Z and Alicia Keys's "Empire State of<br>
Mind.") On second thought, Moore said, "maybe, you know, that would potentially drive<br>
people crazy."<br>
<br>
Then there is the question of how customizable a vehicle's alert system should be. In 2017,<br>
automakers petitioned the N.H.T.S.A. to be allowed to offer drivers a range of options that<br>
they could select from. The agency, after a public-review period, denied the request for<br>
safety reasons, but the issue could come up again. If Boombox, a software feature in<br>
Teslas, is any indication of what's on the way, it will be difficult to limit the sounds<br>
that drivers play through E.V.s' external speakers. Boombox, which was released in<br>
December, 2020, as part of a software update, allows Tesla drivers, according to its<br>
promotional literature, to "delight pedestrians with a variety of sounds from your<br>
vehicle's external speaker," including goat bleats, ice-cream-truck music, applause, and<br>
flatulence. In early 2022, the N.H.T.S.A. found the Boombox feature noncompliant with its<br>
rules. Musk called regulators the "fun police," but Tesla nonetheless issued a firmware<br>
update that prohibits the use of Boombox when driving, although hackers will probably find<br>
a way around it. Teslas can still fart when parked.<br>
<br>
Another possibility is that New York City is just too loud for the relatively civilized<br>
decibel levels established for the alert systems by N.H.T.S.A. regulations. Douglas Moore<br>
told me that "the levels are set to where a normal person would be able to hear it in a<br>
normal situation. It is not expected to be heard in all places"--such as construction<br>
zones--"at all times. Otherwise, you're in the death spiral of just cranking the levels<br>
up."<br>
<br>
But a death spiral could be what we get. Because, after all, what's the point of an alert<br>
if you can't hear it? I borrowed a Mach E not long ago, and took it for a spin around<br>
Brooklyn with a colleague who was planning to record the car in motion. He jumped out on<br>
Kent Street, in Williamsburg, and stood with his microphone as I drove past, but the Mach<br>
E's forward-motion alert barely registered. As a second-story sleeper, I was reassured. As<br>
a cyclist, not so much.<br>
<br>
Just before six the other morning, while I was still asleep, my hearing picked up a novel<br>
sound coming toward me: a thud-thUD-THUD, reverberating off the façade of the apartment<br>
building across the street, getting louder as it came closer.<br>
<br>
Was it an E.V. alert? I woke up just long enough to grasp that it was someone bouncing a<br>
ball down the middle of the street. After passing under my window, the THUD-THud-thud faded<br>
until the street was quiet again. At 6:45 a.m., the first of the garbage trucks came by. cD<br>
<br>
Published in the print edition of the August 8, 2022, issue, with the headline "On Alert."<br>
<br>
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