European Cities; Historic Preservation; Intangible Cultural Heritages; Major Cities; Noise Pollution; Quiet Zone; Smart Phones; Sonic Environment; Sonic Environments; Sound Data; Sound Map; Soundscapes; Soundwalk;

The quality of the sonic environment in major cities is becoming increasingly important owing to growing concerns regarding noise pollution and the need to preserve the soundscape as intangible cultural heritage. The objective of the present study is to demonstrate the use of a smartphone as a platform to collect sound data and generate a sound map based on soundwalks in major European cities. The sonic environments of the five major cities namely Paris, London, Amsterdam, Prague and Milan are presented and compared with those of two smaller European cities: Trondheim and Aachen. Among these seven European cities, Aachen is the quietest city, with equivalent and maximum sound pressure levels (SPLs) of about 66.5 dBA and 85.8 dBA, respectively.