West Hartford, CT Noise Ordinances: Aircraft Noise (2026)

Chapter 123 opens with a scope provision, § 123-2, stating that the chapter applies uniformly to noise in the Town of West Hartford except for a specific list of exempted uses and activities. Subsection Q of that list is a single, unqualified sentence: 'Noise created by aircraft.' Unlike several of the other nineteen exemptions in § 123-2, which attach conditions such as time-of-day windows for lawn equipment (Subsection J) or muffling requirements for snow-removal equipment (Subsection K), the aircraft exemption carries no such condition, meaning it applies at any hour and is not tied to a permit or a decibel ceiling.

That places aircraft noise outside the Article IV noise-district standards in §§ 123-10 through 123-16, which otherwise set numeric dBA ceilings by residential, business and industrial noise district. The chapter's general-compliance clause, § 123-3, still preserves the possibility of a common-law nuisance claim independent of the noise chapter, but Chapter 123 itself creates no permit, decibel limit or enforcement mechanism specific to aircraft.