More than 500,000 people in Dublin have been living with excessive traffic noise.
A study carried out by the Noise Mapping Project, part of Dublin City Council's Road and Traffic Department, found that no area was below guidelines proposed by the World Health Organisation.
It found that residents of Dublin city had noise levels above 55 decibels, which is the upper recommended WHO limit.
The noisiest parts of the capital were the inner-city areas of Dublin 1, 2 and 8.
It was found that between 10% and 15% of the population in these areas were living with environmental noise readings of 75 decibels, which is equivalent to the sound of a vacuum cleaner, and traffic was the main cause.
The survey was carried out before the recently introduced heavy good vehicle ban, so improvement is anticipated in the next study.
The EU will require the council to produce an action plan on how to further reduce noise levels.
