West New York, NJ Noise from Specific Sources: Car Alarm Limits (2026)

Section 266-9E of the Town Code treats a car alarm as a timing problem. All interior and exterior burglar alarms of a building or motor vehicle must be activated in such a manner that the alarm terminates its operation within five minutes for continuous airborne sound and 15 minutes for intermittent sound after it has been activated. The section ends by stating that at all other times the limits set forth in Table I, II or III do not apply, so an alarm that stops inside its window is not measured against the chapter's decibel tables.

The rule is not limited to cars. The same sentence covers a building alarm, interior or exterior, which makes the owner of a store, a multi-dwelling-unit building or a parked vehicle answerable to the same two numbers. The chapter's General References also point readers to Chapter 111, Alarm Systems, for the separate alarm-systems rules.

Because the test is elapsed time, a noise control investigator can enforce it without a sound-level meter. Section 266-5B gives investigators authority over violations that do not require one, naming plainly audible, times of day and distance determinations as examples. Section 266-4A states that the chapter does not apply to the exceptions listed in N.J.A.C. 7:29-1.5, except as provided in sections 266-9 and 266-10, so the alarm limit in 266-9 stays in force.

A first violation that is not the product of purposeful, reckless or criminally negligent conduct, and where no enforcement action has been taken against the violator in the preceding 12 months for the same or a similar violation, is a minor violation under section 266-2. A malfunctioning alarm that triggers a first complaint is therefore handled with a notice of violation and a correction period, not an immediate penalty.