[originaltext]INTERVIEWER: Mr. Cobble, I believe you are the Chairman of the No

INTERVIEWER: Mr. Cobble, I believe you are the Chairman of the Noise Abatement Society. Could you tell us some of the aims of your society?
INTERVIEWEE: Well, our sole purpose is to eliminate all excessive and unnecessary noise from all sources.
INTERVIEWER: Is there any particular source of noise that you are concerned with or that you are fighting against, for example, industrial noise or traffic noise?
INTERVIEWEE: Well, there are about a hundred and one different sources of noise and we get complaints about every one of them, at one time or another. And we deal with about 20,000 complaints a year. There are worse sources of noise, of course. I would say that the one that affects most people in most countries is traffic noise. Air craft noise is worse in intensity, but it affects only about 10% of the population.
INTERVIEWER: Yes, the obvious example is of course Concord, which we’re all reading about.
INTERVIEWEE: I don’t think Concord will go into production as such, not for environmental reasons, although we have been fighting it tooth and nail in many countries, but for economic reasons.
INTERVIEWER: Is there anything that private people can do about noise or is it something that has of necessity to be dealt with by the governments or by the authorities?
INTERVIEWEE: We got the Noise Abatement Act through Parliament. So it is possible, under this law, for any individual to go to his Public Health Department and complain about any noise.  If the Public Health Inspector, on investigating, agrees with the complaint that the noise is a nuisance, he is bound under the terms of the Act, to advise his council to issue an abatement notice. There are two exceptions to this—aircraft noise is above the law, for certain political reasons, and traffic noise, which is dealt with by the police.
INTERVIEWER: We know in fact that people in Britain have become noise-conscious to quite a considerable extent. What about other countries?
INTERVIEWEE: We have an international association against noise, with headquartes in Zurich, and we have conferences in many countries. I would say that possibly at any time of the year there is a noise abatement conference being convened at one or another country throughout the world.
INTERVIEWER: Can I ask you, on a more personal note, what sort of noises you dislike most ?
INTERVIEWEE: I think motorcycles, because young people arc liable to rip up the traffic lights or when you are peacefully driving along in your quiet car, they zoom past you and almost turn you off the read.
INTERVIEWER: Are there any sorts of noise that you enjoy?
INTERVIEWEE: Yes. I like the crackling of my grandchildren. You know, if it’s your child, it’s a pleasant sound, if it is somebody else’s, it’s noise.