In addition to noise pollution generated by the endless building work on Brighton College's Eastern Road site, College Area residents regularly suffer noise pollution caused by noisy sporting and social activities on the adjacent playing field for up to 13.5 hrs a day - from 8 in the morning to 9.30 at night.
The issue is the noise created in the evenings and at the weekends, when residents are being denied their basic right to the peaceful enjoyment of their homes and their environment.
This nuisance is mainly created by 'boarders' - boarding school students, who are seldom supervised. Their numbers have gone up dramatically in recent years - by 400% - and the noise that they make has increased proportionally.
And the noise pollution in the holidays can be even worse. For when the boarders go home in the summer they are replaced by large numbers of excitable language students, who are seemingly free to make as much noise as they like up to, and even after, 10 at night.
The landscape of the playing field is such that it acts as a natural amphitheatre, and as a result as few as half a dozen rowdy students can ruin the leisure of hundreds of residents who live within earshot.
Accordingly, the residents and other parties affected by the nuisance advise Brighton College that, if they hope to retain the goodwill of the community, they should henceforward cease all noisy activity on their playing field, sporting or otherwise, at 6pm on weekdays, and at 1pm on Saturday. On Sunday there should be no noisy activity at all.
(NB The entirely reasonable restrictions on noisy activity proposed in the petition correspond to Brighton & Hove Environmental Health Department's guidelines for noisy commercial activity.)
