Yonkers, NY Noise from Specific Sources: Car Alarm Limits (2026)

§ 66-4E, within Chapter 66's enumeration of prohibited noises, treats a runaway motor vehicle alarm as a violation in its own right: an exterior alarm of a motor vehicle must not audibly sound for more than five minutes continuously or 10 minutes intermittently. The same subsection bars equipping a vehicle with a shaker switch or any other vibration or movement-detecting device that causes the vehicle to sound false alarms, and separately makes it unlawful for a motor vehicle to audibly sound a false alarm at all.

That prohibition sits alongside a general exemption in § 66-6D, which excuses sound from an exterior burglar alarm of any building or motor vehicle, provided that such alarm shall terminate within 15 minutes after it has been activated. Read together, a car alarm that trips briefly and shuts off within 15 minutes falls inside the § 66-6D exemption, but § 66-4E's tighter five-minute continuous or 10-minute intermittent standard is the enumerated violation a noise control officer or police officer enforces against an alarm that keeps sounding.

Liability for an alarm violation follows the registered owner if present, or the person in control of the vehicle. Enforcement follows the same Chapter 66 track: an appearance ticket under § 66-23, with § 66-24 classifying any violation as a Class II offense and § 1-21 setting the penalty at a criminal fine of $100 to $5,000 or up to 15 days in jail, or a civil penalty of $250 to $5,000.