Therefore, a combination of measures is needed, including better urban and transport planning, and significant reductions in road traffic. To reach the zero pollution target, measures would need to target not only populations in high noise hotspots but also those living in areas where noise levels are below national limits.To overcome this obstacle, significantly more effort is needed to address noise from road transport. The main obstacle to reaching the zero pollution target is the difficulty in reducing the large number of people exposed to road traffic noise.Under a less ambitious scenario, the number of people affected by noise is predicted to increase by 3%. Under an optimistic scenario that includes the implementation of a large set of ambitious measures, the number of people highly annoyed by transport noise is predicted to decline by about 19% by 2030.The outlook analysis in this briefing suggests that it is unlikely that this target will be met.

The zero pollution action plan aims to reduce by 2030 the number of people chronically disturbed by transport noise by 30% compared with 2017.About 18 million people suffer from long-term high annoyance due to transport noise in the EU.

Outlook qr