[mhurron]

> There is no need and in some countries that would be against noise pollution laws.

Emergency vehicles are exempt from those laws, as they should be. Safety is more important than your sleep. Trains blow their horns at crossings for the same reason.

Also, I have to laugh at your indignation at someone mowing their lawn at 7am because they are awake but you aren't right after complaining about an empty street at 3am because everyone is asleep.

[deltaqueue]

I have almost hit several emergency vehicles during the day due to my car's sound dampening and my car stereo (which doesn't have to be loud to block out sirens). At night, this has never happened because I have never not seen the seizure-inducing lights. My sample size may be less than a hundred, but you're making an assumption that piercing sirens at night are the most effective way to alert the public of an emergency. And for those blind pedestrians, low-frequency (or even lower decibel) sirens are more than sufficient.

I live on the 9th floor of a condo building that unfortunately has single-pane windows. If I don't have an extremely loud fan blowing, I will be woken up by everything from emergency vehicles to motorcyclists. I realize this comes with the territory of living in a city, but if cosmopolitan cities like Geneva can incorporate effective noise pollution laws* then there's room to improve.

* http://www.cagi.ch/en/logement/bruit-de-voisinage.php

[peacemaker]

> Also, I have to laugh at your indignation at someone mowing their lawn at 7am because they are awake but you aren't right after complaining about an empty street at 3am because everyone is asleep.

I'm not sure what you mean here? I was saying I don't think emergency vehicles need to use their sirens on a quiet street at 3 am in the morning. I was also bemoaning the use of leaf blowers at 7am on a Sunday. Both of those things are annoying yet "technically" I'd say 7am is probably a good time to consider as the start of the day and therefore removal of any noise restrictions. In fact, I think in the UK noise pollution restrictions apply from 11pm - 7am most nights.