Noise cameras on the way in Montgomery County

ROCKVILLE, Md. — In Montgomery County, cameras that detect excessively loud vehicles are on the way.

Tuesday, the County council passed the bill Reduce Excessive Vehicular Noise with Automated Noise Cameras-they did it by a unanimous vote.

“I'm really thrilled to see us move forward with this pilot project,” council Vice President and co-patron of the bill, Kate Stewart said.

Back in September, the council asked for input from the public and got an earful in favor of the bill.

"Oh my God, it’s like the woman said before me (about the loud vehicles) it gets so can't get to sleep at night sometimes,” resident John Becker said outside the hearing.

“We would hear quite a lot of complaints,” Stewart said. “Obviously, they sometimes go up in the nicer weather when people wanted to have their windows open.”

“If somebody is driving through your neighborhood late at night and they've modified their muffler, the sound can be really loud.”

As the program goes forward, now the council will have to begin figuring out the logistics, buying the cameras, and working with police.

“We'll be able to look at and learn from other jurisdictions to make sure that we're picking up people who are actually violating the law and are modifying their mufflers,” Stewart said.

Here is how the program should work. The county decides the target areas for noise violations and puts the cameras up. The cameras should be on a continuous roll but will start recording when a vehicle’s sound reaches above 80 decibels. (80 decibels is the legal limit in Maryland.) Ideally, once the sound reaches 85 decibels, the recording gets sent to authorities.

“Then somebody who is trained will have to review those videos to make sure that they are picking up the appropriate thing before sending out a warning or a citation,” Stewart said.

The maximum fine from the pilot program has been levied at $75.

Now the council and police will collaborate to start the pilot program.

So when will the cameras start going up? Stewart said not to expect them before the year ends.

“This is new technology and there are only a handful of vendors that actually provide these types of cameras,” she said. “I'm hoping that we'll get them in the next few months.”