Other noise issues

Fridley has a history of plopping noisy
industrial operations next to existing
residential neighborhoods.

I lived in my house for decades before a great many facilities were plopped adjacent to my neighborhood.
Many are creating noise disturbances for hours at a time. You can forget about enjoying Locke Park or the adjacent woods and trails of Rice Creek.

The noises are under the categories of humming, buzzing,
grinding, thumping, whistling, roaring, beeping..

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Poor, thoughtless, engineering of air exchangers
with no oversight by City Hall.

Along with Target's backup beepers, air exchanger noise is what I consider to be the biggest problem in Fridley neighorhoods. These are wrongly designed air exchangers, installed on wrongly located industrial buildings.

Target Distribution Center is one of four industrial operations that are currently blasting our neighborhood 24/7 with a wrongly designed air exchange system. Target, like the other industrial operations of subject, had gone 30 years with no air circulation system whatsoever, only to install an entirely wrong exterior-mounted system that blasts the neighborhood. City Hall chooses to be disengaged.

Target did make adjustments to their air exchange system in 2019 after receiving complaints. It had been significantly out of legal range and had a particularly harsh sound quality. The most recent time I checked, it is still out of legal range -- registering 53 dB at the edge of the woods in Locke Park even during the 7 PM to 7 AM hours (when the legal limit is 50 dB). While their air exchanger is not the dominant noise inside my house with my windows closed -- as it had been prior to 2019 -- I do sometimes hear it inside my house with the windows closed and especially inside my house with the windows open. Wind direction, wind speed and humidity all affect how loud it is at my house.

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Extremely out of legal range - without justification

Unity Hospital has been running their east air exchanger at an extremely illegal noise level since April of 2024.

That air exchanger noise also penetrates my house -- loudly -- when my window is open, even though I live 1/3 mile from it.

For Unity Hospital's first 50 years, they had no exterior-mounted air exchanger whatsoever; certainly nothing that I was hearing at my property. Beginning in 2015 the air exchanger noise began. With my input, they fixed the system in 2019. It remained fixed until the hospital got a new facility manager -- sometime prior to April of 2024.

Unity's air exchanger is currently running at 69 decibels as measured across the street from their property, day and night, even though the legal limit is 50 decibels at night and 60 decibels during the day. City Hall has done nothing about it, though they were notified about it in May of 2024. That was more than a year ago.

As I previously indicated -- that air exchanger used to run within the legal limit and with a smooth sound quality. Good engineering is available, yet, neither hospital management nor City Hall does anything about it.

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I'm being intermittently blasted by AAMCO's new HVAC
system, which is seriously wrongly engineered.

Though I'm 1/5 mile from them, it can sound like
I'm living on an airport runway. It is that loud
when the wind is calm and the humidity is high.
The higher the combination of humidity and stillness
of air, the louder it is. Even under normal atmospheric
conditions, it often dominates the soundscape and drives
me to flee indoors and close all my windows.

I should not be forced out of my beloved house,
which has been in my family for 68 years, by
industrial property owners who have no
respect for the residential neighborhoods that
predate their businesses. Quieter HVAC systems
are available.

10/25/25: I've noticed a visual change in their equipment
and a quieter operation. But the weather has been cooler,
so I don't know whether there's been a permanent change.
One never knows what's coming in Fridley.

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Generator, transformer and other industrial
noise is also an ongoing problem.

You won't necessarily hear every type of humming, buzzing or thumping noise when you are outside your house. But your house acts as a speaker box, with the walls and windows acting as diaphragms -- broadcasting the humming, buzzing or thumping sounds throughout the interior of your house, including your basement. Any time of the day or night, any day of the week.

I've had some success in getting the city to address some of the issues, only to have the very same facilities become a problem again at a later point in time. I simply never know what's coming next.

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Wrong use of sirens

The manner in which the Unity Hospital ambulance drivers use their sirens is ample reason to not live in Fridley.

They run their sirens strictly without letup throughout the course of apparently every single run - even when there is literally zero traffic - such as between midnight and 4 A.M., waking up thousands of people through closed windows.

That is the opposite of the industry guidelines. City Hall has the right to set the rules, but true to form, they fail.

See: warranted use of sirens.

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Boom boxes are also a frequent problem. There are not enough people left in Fridley who are willing to do anything about it.

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This page was updated on 10/25/2025