Abstract Noise pollution is a growing threat to public health in dense cities yet widely used quietness indices were calibrated in European contexts and transfer poorly to Asian megacities. This study proposed the Adaptive Quietness Suitability Index (AQSI), a refined, validated framework that enhances sensitivity, accuracy, and transferability in mixed-use urban environments. The AQSI advances three elements: (i) dynamic impact-zone delineation via physics-based sound propagation rather than fixed buffers, (ii) alignment with locally regulated noise limits and control zones, and (iii) explicit temporal stratification (daytime, evening, nighttime, all-day) to capture diurnal variability. We validated the AQSI using monitoring data from 1997 to 2024 in New Taipei City, Taiwan, and compared it to the original QSI through regression and spatial analyses. The AQSI showed stronger agreement with measured sound levels than the original QSI (Pearson’s r = −0.238 vs. −0.202), representing a 39 % improvement in explained variance ( R 2 = 0.057 vs. 0.041). It eliminated extreme-value saturation (0 or 1 in 86.2 % of cells) and reduced it to 0 %, yielding continuous gradients that better resolved intermediate environments. Nighttime emerged as the critical period, with the steepest negative coefficient (−0.0142, p < 0.001) and the highest adjusted R 2 (0.16), highlighting the need for nocturnal noise management. By integrating operational mapping with soundscape-aware considerations at a 50 m resolution, the AQSI provides a transparent, context-sensitive tool for urban planning, regulatory compliance, and targeted mitigation in diverse metropolitan settings.
Lin et al. (Thu,) studied this question.