Living with Each Other - Lifestyle Noise and Odors I watched SNL last night and it got me thinking and motivated this post. Ive even attached the clip. I never want to become like fictitious Mrs. Santini in the clip, but sometimes, neighbors, both new and old make me want to be... LIFESTYLE NOISE Some of us dont like notes under our door. I know Ive gotten a few over the years. But until I got a dose of what I was giving, I never realized how bad it can be. When the neighbors above me who were here for what seemed like forever moved out I got two male roommates as new neighbors. Theyd drop things on the floor, have football parties, clomp around in their hard shoes, etc. I started to realize why my neighbor below me complained so bitterly. I started to understand the impact I was having on my neighbors below, because of my own similar behavior. But only when it started happening to me. So I started taking my work shoes off when I came home. I began easing my door closed with the doorknob instead of impatiently rushing into my apartment to do what was ever next. I added an extra layer of padding under my area rugs. I was cognizant not to drop things. The not so nicely worded notes stopped! The lesson I learned was do unto others as you would have done unto you. And, these apartments do nothing to stop noise. We have to take small steps and create new habits to do it. We dont live in houses with insulation and open space between. At any one time there can be 1 or more people to each side of us, above and below us. ODORS Last night was the weekly cooking night for one of the families on my floor. If you opened your apartment door on my floor the odor was overwhelming and not so pleasant. The odor also bothers our adjoining neighbors, one who has a small child. It actually makes you want to well (...). Very pungent, I can never guess what it is. I just want to run inside and open my windows. As a tenant advocate, I remember sitting in a meeting with years ago with our then new landlord, Tishman Speyer, with some members of their senior staff and the then State Senator, Tom Duane. We were discussing some issues negatively affecting tenants, once we got through our agenda, T/S had theirs. They wanted to talk about the positive things they had in store for us. One item they talked about was an idea that would save money and keep the heat in the building and bad smells out of the hallways by creating reverse pressure on the stack. Huh? Today our buildings have negative pressure. Cold air from the outside pushes into our apartments and through, and under our apartment doors into the hallway. (Of course too when we open our apartment doors.) We all know hot air rises. With the vents in the hallway that vent to the roof along with two fire stairways that dont always have their doors fully closed, an upward pressure is created. This helps pull odors from apartments into the hallways, good smells and bad. It also explains why our apartment doors slam so hard on a windy day (hint to all, the door knob is for more that opening your door, it is also a useful tool to ease it closed.) Tishman had a plan to install fans that would bring warmed filtered air into the building from the roof pushing it downward. That would create a positive downward pressure and cancel the negative pressure. It turn, that would keep the heat in the building and of course odors inside everyones apartments. That was actually a good idea in my mind. One that never got implemented. (Although, one that would have probably resulted though in a big MCI increase.) When I cook, I use my exhaust fan. (a Hunter Fan) Of course your apartment doesnt come with one. But it is a great tool for this purpose and it prevents any odors from getting into the hall. I also use it for cooling my overheated apartment. After not being home a while the temperature can reach 80° in my apartment. A quick fix for this is to use the exhaust fan. I open my bedroom window halfway, my living room a little less, then the kitchen window fully and turn on my hunter fan. In less than 30 minutes the temperature drops to about 71°. Then I close all my windows, but I do leave one or two slightly cracked to maintain it. This is much better than running your air conditioner in the winter. By the way, if it is less than 55° outside youll wreck your ACs compressor if you do, so dont do it. Really the onus is on our management company, CompassRock Real Estate to better educate new residents and to periodically remind tenured residents, that noise carries, and there are many little things we can do, habits we can start (like removing our shoes when we come home) that go a long way to being a good neighbor.
Posted on: Mon, 19 Jan 2015 19:25:42 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015