Exclusive | NYC restaurants are very loud – so this New Yorker is trying to make the decibel levels public

He is making a racket with this noise complaint.

A pensioner outraged by noisy cafes and loud restaurants has launched a petition for Big Apple restaurants to publicly post their decibel levels so those seeking quiet can make informed decisions about where to dine.

“Good food and bad conversation is a bad meal,” Howard Davis, 87, told The Post, saying he’s tired of having trouble hearing his dinner dates over the noise.

“It’s virtually impossible to go to a restaurant where the noise isn’t loud,” added the retired attorney, who lives on the Upper East Side and dines out up to four nights a week.

Among Davis’ list of loudest offenders: Becco and Smith, both in Midtown, and Sojourn and Blue Mezze, both on the Upper East Side.

More than 230 people have added their signatures to the petition, which was posted on Change.org late last year.

“Wouldn’t it be nice to know how loud a restaurant is before you decide if you want to eat there, especially since loud noise can cause hearing loss?” Davis stated, asking the Hospitality Industry Associations to have an “expert” measure the decibel level of each restaurant.

Federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration regulations warn of permanent hearing damage at decibel levels above 70.

Some loud restaurants in NYC blare over 90 decibels – the equivalent of the sound of a motorcycle that instantly enlarges your ears.

Diners are divided on the proposal, with some saying a noisy restaurant only adds to the hectic hustle and bustle of the Big Apple.

“Stay home if you hate noise,” advertising account director Frances Hughes, 29, told The Post bluntly. “The city’s dining scene is so much fun and so vibrant.”

Former NYC Mayor Mike Bloomberg agrees, implying that the turmoil shows the city has rebounded from the crippling COVID pandemic.

“I was just in a restaurant last night. you could not hearthe buzz was so great,” he enthused about Elio’s Uptown hotspot in September 2023.

Hughes, who lives in Williamsburg and dines out often, worries that publicly posting a restaurant’s decibel level will negatively impact louder restaurants, with owners potentially fearing “backlash for being too loud.”

“It would be a shame for some of the louder places to feel like they have to tone it down so it doesn’t show up too high on a decibel level list,” she said.

However, other customers are annoyed by the racket.

The Post’s own Steve Cuozzo has repeatedly railed against the “ear-splitting inferno” of New York restaurants, saying the healthy situation seems to be getting worse.

“We’ve always had loud restaurants … but now it’s hard to find any place that doesn’t take a bite out of the sensory receptors of your ears,” he wrote in 2018. “The fearful will have their seats absent racket noises, restaurateurs seem to be cultivating more and more cacophony. “

In 2023, Cuozzo complained that “cacophony reigns in many restaurants,” citing Tatiana, Le Rock, Bad Roman, Sartiano’s, and Cafe Chelsea among noisy hotspots.

Andrew Rigie of the NYC Hospitality Alliance described the decibel proposal as an “overcomplicated mandate against small business” in a statement provided to PIX11.

Huges, who likes loud restaurants, similarly believes it’s the bureaucracy.

“I feel for older people or people with noise concerns — but it’s New York,” Hughes said. “There are many places at the quieter end of the scale, and communities sharing the knowledge of these places with each other is a better solution than adding more bureaucracy and headaches for restaurants.”

Still, Davis, who is making some serious noise about his decibel petition to make sure it’s heard, insists he’s not trying to get restaurants to change their vibe. Instead, he just wants consumers to be aware of what they want.

“If someone wants to go to a loud restaurant, that’s their call,” he said. “If the owner wants to keep a loud restaurant, that’s their call. We’re not asking anyone to change anything.”

Davis insists he has had an “overwhelmingly” positive response to the petition, even from young people.

“It’s not that they like the noise, they just tolerate it,” he told The Post of Young Diners. “I’ve never met anyone who goes to a restaurant and asks the manager to make it higher.”

With the petition still circulating, diners are finding other inventive ways to avoid loud restaurants.

SoundPrint, the self-described “Yelp for noise,” clocks decibel levels in 3,000 New York City restaurants above 75 decibels.

In 2023, SoundPrint – which can be downloaded to your smartphone – found that 63% of restaurants are too loud for a conversation.