Although visual signage is a dominant part of railway life, so too is audible
signage. It takes the form of announcements, whistles, train sounds and so on. Indeed,
railway sounds, especially those of locomotives, have exerted a particular fascination,
more so, than the sounds of other modes of transporta fact reflected in the prevalence
of musical compositions and poetry endeavouring to simulate them. This chapter’s
principal subjects of analysis are those sounds that are deliberately reticulated through
trains and stations as part of the larger scale technology of passenger administration and
regulation. It is argued that the development of public address systems (PAs) was a
seminal development in the evolution of such technology, enabling passenger control to
be conducted at a distance, invisibly, without direct human involvement. The
development of recorded message technology and digital sound systems further
extended the machinery of population administration. It enabled more sophisticated
forms of action at a distance to be instituted, ones that in the main were exercised
asynchronously. At the same time, the sound behaviour of passengers, especially that
associated with mass adoption of portable technologies such as mobile phones and
tablets, has been subjected to increased regulation through the proclamation of quiet
carriages.
Keywords: Ensoniment, Muzak, noise, passenger information systems, public
address systems, railway announcements, schizophonia, sound administration,
soundscape.
