{"id":3923,"date":"2013-09-18T15:43:36","date_gmt":"2013-09-18T19:43:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=3923"},"modified":"2013-09-25T14:52:43","modified_gmt":"2013-09-25T18:52:43","slug":"noise-bylaws-could-be-tightened-up-to-reflect-lifestyles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/noise-bylaws-could-be-tightened-up-to-reflect-lifestyles\/","title":{"rendered":"Noise bylaws could be tightened up to reflect \u201clifestyles\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n

Have you been part of Aurora\u2019s “mass civil disobedience\u201d?<\/p>\n

If so, changes at Town Hall could mean you\u2019ll no longer have to face the music. <\/p>\n

Councillors approved a motion last week to review and revise bylaws prohibiting music from outdoor speakers in many circumstances in Aurora. In his motion, Councillor John Abel underscored bylaws barring music from playing on exterior outdoor speakers, while music projected outdoors from indoor speakers does not fall under similar restrictions. <\/p>\n

A revision, he added, would \u201cbetter reflect the modern lifestyles of residents of our Town.\u201d<\/p>\n

His motion was spurred by a delegation to Council last month from resident Tom Beck. At the time, Mr. Beck told Council he had received a write up from a municipal bylaw officer for playing music on outdoor speakers. He returned this week in support of the motion.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt came to my attention in June that this bylaw existed when I had a violation,\u201d he said. \u201cI have been here half my life and never even knew about it. I have been talking to a lot of people and nobody knew about [it either]. It is a lifestyle that we have come to enjoy, having a little bit of music going. The recommendation given to me was I should stick speakers in my windows, which would be somewhat more offensive than the little speakers I have.\u201d<\/p>\n

Techa van Leewen, Aurora\u2019s Director of Bylaw Services, told Council that the Town\u2019s noise bylaws do prohibit certain noises and activities at certain parts of the day. Amplified music, if it is audible to surrounding premises, falls under this ban, she added, but it is permitted if it is not audible to other homes and buildings, she added.<\/p>\n

\u201cNoise travels in peculiar ways and is very subjective, as is music,\u201d she said. \u201cIf we were to amend the bylaw to permit outdoor playing of music being audible to premises other than where it is originating, we may see an increase in complaints and there may be an impact on staff: how do you regulate the types of music, how loud it is being played, and those kinds of things.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Councillor Evelyn Buck, the fact that these things can be subjective highlights a bigger problem. Depending on the day, the weather, and other conditions, noise can travel differently.<\/p>\n

\u201cHow do you enforce such a bylaw?\u201d she asked. \u201cI am wondering if we should have it at all. The more I hear, the more I think this bylaw is problematic and it should be taken off the books altogether.\u201d<\/p>\n

Other Councillors, however, saw merit in keeping it \u2013 but to better reflect reality. <\/p>\n

\u201cI was quite shocked to hear this was on the books and I completely agree with the motion to revisit it,\u201d said Councillor John Gallo. \u201cYou would be surprised by the number of people contravening this bylaw.\u201d<\/p>\n

Speaking to the number of people indeed contravening it, Councillor Abel said, with a laugh that revising the bylaw \u201cmight\u2026mitigate the large civil disobedience going on in our Town.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWith our lifestyle in Aurora, there are lots of opportunities to sit in your backyard and enjoy some music,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Other Councillors, however, were more cautious in moving forward. Councillor Wendy Gaertner, for instance, said she was in favour of sending the bylaw back to staff for review, but wanted further information on what other municipalities were doing. Councillor Chris Ballard expressed a similar view.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t necessarily want to send this back to staff for a really in-depth report because I think we will find that every municipality is doing this kind of thing,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir Have you been part of Aurora\u2019s “mass civil disobedience\u201d? If so, changes at Town Hall could mean you\u2019ll no longer have to face the music. Councillors approved a motion last week to review and revise bylaws prohibiting music from outdoor speakers in many circumstances in Aurora. In his motion, Councillor John Abel […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3923","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archive"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-11h","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-16 18:14:09","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3923","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3923"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3923\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3923"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3923"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3923"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}