The bar charts compare the number of people affected by four types of noise pollution (traffic, trains, aircraft, and industry) between urban and rural areas of Europe in 2007.
Overall, while the traffic noise affected most people in both areas, a reversal pattern was true for the industry. Moreover, the number of noise pollution victims during the day was relatively higher than those of at night except from individuals affected by industry noises in cities.
Traffic noise affected approximately 68 million people in cities and roughly 35 million in the countryside during the day, while at night the numbers dropped to about 48 million and 24 million respectively. When it comes to trains, their noise influenced 10 million people in cities in the daytime and around 8 million people in the nighttime; however, both figures were less by about 2 million in rural areas.
Less than 10 million individuals were affected by the other two types of noises. One of them is from aircraft, which impacted nearly 4 million people in urban and roughly 2 million in rural areas throughout the day, with both affecting around 1 million people at night. The other one is from industry, affecting approximately 1 million people over the day in cities, and less than a million throughout the night.