Create 2D Noise Contours

[Don_Snow]

Hello, 

I am trying to experiment with creating noise contours for a property map I am creating for a client airport. There has been some delay in the partner originally brought on by the airport so to save some time I am looking into creating them myself. 

I understand I can create a noise map, and I have created contour lines using a DEM, but I do not know of a way to create the noise contours using ArcGIS Pro (If Possible). 

I appreciate any input on the topic. Thank you in advance!

[DanPatterson]

contours can be created from any numeric data measured on an interval/ratio scale.  elevation is only one such example

[Don_Snow]

Hello Dan, 

Thats great information. Do you have an answer as to how I would incorporate that noise data into creating the contour lines?

[DanPatterson]

you interpolate the noise data itself, assuming that they come from point locations, then contour that surface

An overview of the Interpolation toolset—ArcGIS Pro | Documentation

Contour (Spatial Analyst)—ArcGIS Pro | Documentation

There are numerous interpolation methods in the Spatial Analyst and other extensions

[KiyoshiYamashita]

Yeah... creating the contours is actually the easy part, once you have noise data in raster format.  The interpolation approach mentioned above is probably the best if you're trying to represent observed noise.  In other words, if you have a collection of noise observations/measurements, you can use interpolation to create a raster that will allow you to build contours.  But often airports are trying to do noise studies based on things like types of aircraft and normal traffic patterns.  Unfortunately, I don't believe we have specific tools for doing this modeling yet... there's some hefty science behind it.  I imagine it would be possible, but would have to learn more about the specific models first.  There are other tools that are commonly used for this though.  FAA's Aviation Environmental Design Tool (https://aedt.faa.gov/) is probably one of the biggest.  I haven't used it myself, but if it can output a raster, you could very easily create the contours from there.