Sound of summer: The crusade to fix pickleball's noise problem

There is no debating, pickleball is what economists would term a growth industry

Billions have been poured into the sport during its explosion over the last five to six years

The race is just beginning, however, to spend some of those dollars

fixing the pickleball noise problem we outlined previously. It can seem at times there is just no way around that noise

That can be so grating to those who live near a pickleball court

We spoke with Kathleen Romito, a retired family physician who published a paper on the adverse health effects people are suffering after being exposed to excessive pickleball noise

When courts were installed just 57 feet from her house, she felt the effects firsthand and decided she needed to take a deeper look into the issue

It's bringing people together. It's providing a sense of community. It is making the world a better place

And so I tried as a physician to accept it in my house until I started having nightmares about it and started having moments of really weird rage and just started to notice what was going on in me

And yet I thought it was just me. During her research, Ramito expected to hear about the anxiety, the stress and the psychological problems that can be associated with exposure to constant loud noises

What she didn't expect were the self-reported physical health concerns. The brain and the body used the fight or flight physiological response to deal with the unique noise of pickleball paddles hitting that plastic ball About half of the comments that people are making out there in the public about their response have to do with physical symptoms Heart issues brain or

neurologic issues, disrupted sleep, things that we might consider more physical symptoms. I wake

up in the middle of the night and my heart is racing and I think I hear pickleball pops outside

Ramito said most of those complaints came from people living within 100 feet of a court

But even outside that distance, up to 400 feet away, she learned there were side effects

especially when the noise lasts for more than 12 hours during a summer day

Even the leading sound experts are saying, you know, in that distance, the only success stories we're seeing are

you have to limit the hours of exposure. You have to use high quality sound barriers

and you have to be able to mandate the use of quiet equipment. It's not just one thing or another

You have to do all three of those. That is where a consultant like Dale VanScoik comes in

He's a player and a referee who describes the noise as an impulse sound

humans are genetically trained to listen to. His company, Pickleball Sound Mitigation

helps communities devise solutions to the noise problem. When we're looking at court areas

What we usually look for is a barrier option first. That could be thick padding, a sound-absorbing cloth attached to a fence, or even soundproof glass

There are hundreds of companies that cater to this demand, but at a steep price

In December, the town of Camas, Washington, decided against installing sound barriers on their pickleball courts

because the options presented by the park director ranged in price from to So what the next suggestion Van Squaic says quieter paddles are a big help According to Dink Pickleball a custom equipment designer there are over 800 companies that make

more than 4,000 different brands or styles of paddles. It helps to have a company like VanScoik's

wade through them all to find the most effective noise dampening models. Because we have tested a

lot of paddles, hundreds. We have what's known as the blue list of paddles. It's models that are

if you think about, if there's a whole spectrum of paddles, if you can eliminate the noisiest half

you've done something. Pickleball's been the fastest growing sport in the U.S. four consecutive

years, but manufacturers like Selkirk, Jula, Gamma, and Paddle Tech have only now begun to pivot to

quieter equipment approved by the sports governing body, USA Pickleball. Those companies also cater to competitive players who won't use a quieter paddle

if the noise mitigation technology affects the quality of play. Those top players say sound can be a signifier

It can tell you where the ball is going. And then there are the pickleball balls themselves

Players say they can have a big impact on the game. The Franklin X40 is the gold standard and most popular

It's also noisy. Enter a company like Accel Digital Solutions in Grand Rapids, Michigan

After some 20 iterations, they've perfected the DigiPro, a 3D printed ball that can lower impact sound by more than 10 decibels

It's a pretty interesting ball. This is really quiet. I'm bouncing it on my desk here and you can't hear it at all

The bounce is the same The size is the same The weight is the same In general the wind doesn affect it All those are factors that in pickleball make a difference

But how fast the popularity grows, we'll just have to see. Price may once again be a roadblock here

The DigiPro retails for $30. That's roughly eight times more expensive than the X40 balls from Franklin

That said, technology seems to be helping push a little bit of progress

How fast and on what scale the changes are adopted are the real questions

According to Van Skoik, the industry as a whole is aware the noise issues will only

get worse as more cords are built to answer demand. More than 18,000 new cords were built in 2024 alone

Ramito knows she can't turn back the clock. The sport will only continue to grow

she says her research shows there's only one reliable answer to the problem. I don't envy the

people, the decision makers. And I understand that there are politics involved, that there's money

involved. And yet we as a society generally don't put dog kennels or shooting ranges or hockey rinks

right next to homes. It was an easy solution during the pandemic to use those tennis courts

But I think it's time to realize, you know, pickleball for the most part in urban areas probably belongs indoors

And we need to find new solutions. Is the sport at a tipping point

Romito believes there's an opportunity for more research covering the impacts exposure to this type of noise can have on people

She's also hoping for more discussion from all sides of the great pickleball debate

More discussion and of course more money may eventually lead to more solutions

For Straight Arrow News, I'm Chris Francis