Smyrna, TN Noise from Specific Sources: Delivery Truck Noise (2026)

The Smyrna Town Council regulates truck noise through the anti-noise section of Title 11, Chapter 4, § 11-401. It opens with a general ban on unreasonably loud, disturbing, and unnecessary noise, then lists examples that the section says are not exclusive. Two of them reach commercial vehicles at the curb.

Subsection (1)(j) covers loading and unloading operations. It prohibits the creation of any loud and excessive noise in connection with the loading or unloading of any vehicle, and it adds the opening and destruction of bales, boxes, crates, and other containers. The test is a noise standard, not a clock: the subsection prints no decibel reading and no start or end hour, so a delivery driver at a retail dock or a residential street is judged on whether the noise is loud and excessive.

Subsection (1)(m) is the hour-based rule. Garbage pick-up by commercial garbage and waste businesses is prohibited between 10:00 p.m. and 6:00 a.m. Monday through Friday, and between 10:00 p.m. and 8:00 a.m. on Saturday and Sunday. The subsection does not apply to parcels zoned for commercial or industrial use, so the restriction protects residential neighborhoods and leaves dumpster service at commercial and industrial sites free of the hour limit.

Other enumerated items also catch trucks. Subsection (1)(a) limits horn blowing on a truck that is not in motion to a danger signal, and (1)(e) prohibits using a truck so out of repair or so loaded as to cause loud and unnecessary grating, grinding, or rattling. Under subsection (2)(a), a vehicle of the town engaged in necessary public business is exempt from the section.