“Medium Pitched Humming Noise on 14th Street”?

Photo by PoPville flickr user Eric Spiegel

“Dear PoPville,

There is a medium pitched humming noise that comes on every 5 or so minutes and stays on for 5 or more minutes, all day, every day. The noise has been going on since spring or so. We live on Belmont Street between 13 and 14 and this noise is a real nuisance to a point where it is bothering us and affecting our quality of life. The noise is coming through open windows and even through the bathroom vent. We have tried to track down the noise, but we can only go as far as maybe 14 and Florida and we can’t follow the noise anymore, and I think that is because we are walking on the ground level and the noise is coming from some roof top. Our best guess as to the origin of the noise is from an HVAC system on one of the buildings between 13 and 15 and south of Florida and north of U Street. I am sure we are not the only street being bothered by this annoying noise since I have heard the noise when I walk around the area mentioned above, so I hope to hear from you guys who live around this area who could point us to the building that is causing this noise so that we can notify them to fix it. Thank you!”

Probably too far away but over the weekend on the Columbia Heights listserv a resident wrote:

“For those of us who live in close proximity to the Giant grocery store at 1345 Park, or just frequent it, it’s a common occurrence to hear hours of a high pitched tone. We’ve asked over and over how to fix this (what we’ve been told is that it’s an alarm initiated by an open back door, though closing the door doesn’t seem to shut it off), but it keeps happening. Today it’s been going since about 9am. Does anyone have any contacts there with management or the owners of the building to figure out a strategy to fix this? It’s making us nuts!”