Low frequency cultural noise

Abstract

Abnormal cultural seismic noise is observed in the frequency range of 0.01-0.05 Hz. Cultural noise generated by human activities is generally observed in frequencies above 1 Hz, and is greater in the daytime than at night. The low-frequency noise presented in this paper exhibits a characteristic amplitude variation and can be easily identified from time domain seismograms in the frequency range of interest. The amplitude variation is predominantly in the vertical component, but the horizontal components also show variations. Low-frequency noise is markedly periodic, which reinforces its interpretation as cultural noise. Such noise is observed world-wide, but is limited to areas in the vicinity of railways. The amplitude variation in seismograms correlates strongly with railway timetables, and the waveform shows a wavelength shift associated with the Doppler effect, which indicates that the origin of seismic background noise in the frequency range 0.01-0.05 Hz is railways. Copyright 2009 by the American Geophysical Union.