Forecast Models for Road Traffic Noise in The Year 2050 as a Basis for the Development of Measures to Reduce Noise in Urban Areas

The German Climate Protection Act aims to reduce greenhouse gases. The focus is on harmful emissions, while noise, which can also lead to physiological and psychological disorders, has been neglected. An effective transformation of the transport sector requires long-term developments in the economy, society, politics and technology. The complexity of these future developments leads to high planning uncertainty. Therefore, the scenario technique is used as a method of futurology. The aim of this research is to analyse the development of urban noise for the year 2050. The purpose is to provide an instrument for future planning of noise abatement in road traffic. As a basis, key factors are identified, described and analysed, whereby a long-term horizon and megatrends are considered. Taking into account greenhouse gas reduction measures, national transport scenarios and socio-economic scenarios are included in order to forecast the development of road traffic noise up to 2050. Reference and stability scenarios are developed and the qualitative data from these scenarios are converted using statistical analysis into quantitative forecasts. The average traffic volume is calculated using multiple regression equations from the forecasts of traffic performance and traffic volume. The developments of the settlement-structural district types are determined by logarithmic trend lines. Based on these forecasts, planning situations are created. They deal with typical situations in the development of residential areas. These situations are combined with various road traffic noise sources to form an application case and presented graphically for the future scenarios. These are fictitious development plans in the sense of urban planning, which can be traced back to real planning cases in the future. For each planning situation, a noise immission plan is also simulated and the noise level differences compared. The noise immission plans for the year 2050 shows that without additional noise reduction measures, no significant reduction in noise levels can be expected. Despite the achievement of climate protection targets in the stability scenario, there are no perceivable differences in noise levels compared to the reference scenario. Therefore, noise reduction measures need to be increasingly considered in mobility concepts and transport development planning, as well as in spatial development planning.