How to Make a Simple Sound Map of a Park, Garden, or Street
To make a simple sound map, sit or stand in one safe spot, mark your position in the center of a page, and place each sound around it according to the direction and approximate distance you hear it. Add a small legend and record when and for how long you listened. This method is for one listener mapping the sounds around a single everyday place—not for measuring sound levels or proving a source’s exact location.
What a simple sound map records
A sound map combines a rough spatial layout with brief observations. It should let someone reading it answer four questions: Where was the listener? Which way was each sound? How far away did it seem? When during the listening period did it occur? The Royal Horticultural Society’s activity puts the listener in the center and uses arrows to show where sounds seem to come from; a sound-mapping lesson from the Prince William Sound Regional Citizens’ Advisory Council adds approximate distance, sound type, and frequency or number of occurrences. RHS: “Draw a sound map”, PWSRCAC: “Sound Mapping”
Keep the map modest. You are noting what you can hear from one listening position, not surveying the whole area. A sound may travel from outside the drawn boundary, bounce off buildings, or be masked by another sound. Mark what you perceived and signal uncertainty instead of guessing at an exact source.
Choose a listening spot and set the map’s orientation
Choose a place where you can remain still for several minutes without blocking a path or needing to watch your footing. A park bench, garden edge, or quiet spot beside a building can work. For an indoor map, pick a position with a range of audible sounds rather than one dominated by a television or radio; the PWSRCAC lesson notes that mapping can be done indoors as well as outdoors. PWSRCAC: “Sound Mapping”
Draw a small boundary or rough shape for the area you can identify. Put an X or a dot in the center and label it “listener.” Choose a fixed landmark in front of you—such as a gate, path, or building—and mark it at the top of the page. Write “facing [landmark]” beside the map. This gives your directions a stable reference even if the page is not aligned to north. If you know compass direction, add north too, but it is optional.
Add the place name or a plain description, the date, and the start time. Record the listening duration when you finish. If you return to compare maps later, keep the same position and facing direction when practical; otherwise note the change, since a different listening position changes the directions and distances you perceive.
Listen first, then place each sound
Pause before drawing and listen for about a minute. The Sensory Trust suggests staying still for a short period, such as five minutes, while noting where sounds come from; the PWSRCAC activity uses a five-to-ten-minute listening window. These are useful examples, not fixed requirements: choose an interval that fits the place and your available time. Sensory Trust: “Sound maps”, PWSRCAC: “Sound Mapping”
As you hear something, make a small mark in the direction it seems to come from. Use closer positions for sounds that seem nearby and farther positions for those that seem distant. The page does not need a precise scale; add a note such as “distance approximate” so readers know that spacing is a listening estimate, not a measured distance.
Describe the audible event before naming its cause. “Low steady hum” is a direct observation; “air conditioner” is an interpretation. If you recognize the source with confidence, add it after the description: “low steady hum, likely ventilation.” If you cannot tell, write “source unclear.” The RHS activity encourages making a guess about whether a sound comes from an animal or a human-made source, but a guess should remain visibly a guess. RHS: “Draw a sound map”
If several sounds overlap, give them separate marks when you can distinguish their directions. If one masks another or makes its source hard to place, note “partly masked” or use an uncertainty symbol. A busy soundscape makes source localization harder even in technical recordings, as OpenSoundscape’s acoustic-localization documentation explains; a hand-drawn map should therefore avoid implying precision it cannot provide. OpenSoundscape: “Acoustic localization”
Make a small legend for direction, distance, and sound
Use a few repeatable marks, then explain them in a key. For example:
The rings are categories, not units. Define them in plain language if useful—for example, “near = clearly close; far = audible but difficult to place”—and avoid adding feet or metres unless you actually estimated or measured them. Use words, simple drawings, or onomatopoeia for sound qualities: “chirp-chirp,” “rattle,” “steady rush.” The PWSRCAC lesson lists drawings, symbols, descriptions, and onomatopoeia as ways to record sounds, and recommends indicating location, description, and how often a sound was heard. PWSRCAC: “Sound Mapping”
Add time references without crowding the map
Write the overall start time and duration near the title block. For individual events, use a simple time label such as 2 min or 09:14, depending on whether you want elapsed time or clock time. A brief notation can show both: 09:14 / 2 min: three sharp calls, upper right, far. For a continuous sound, record when you noticed it and whether it continued to the end: 09:12–09:18: low traffic wash, left/front, steady.
If tracking every event time makes listening difficult, divide the session into a few intervals—such as minutes 0–2, 2–4, and 4–6—and note the interval beside each mark. Include the interval length in the legend. The map then shows both spatial placement and when sounds occurred, without turning into a transcript. If exact timing matters, use a watch or clock rather than estimating from memory afterward.
A worked example for a six-minute garden listen
Imagine sitting at one garden bench facing a gate. Your page has the listener at the center, the gate at the top, and a note that says Tuesday, 09:12; listening: 6 min. You hear a continuous low rush ahead and to the left, a few short calls high and to the right, and a single clatter behind you. You do not know what made the clatter.
Your map could place ≈ low rush in the far-left area with 0–6 min beside it; mark three small call symbols in the upper-right area with 1, 3, 5 min; and put clatter? behind the listener with 4 min. The legend explains that repeated rings indicate perceived distance, ? marks uncertain source, and the gate sets the top of the page. This is an illustrative example, not a report of an actual listening session.
Notice that the sound descriptions and positions stay separate from source claims. If you later identify the rush as traffic or the calls as birds, add that as a qualified note after the listening session rather than silently changing the original observation.
Check the map before you finish
Before leaving, check that another person could orient themselves from the page. Confirm that the map labels the listener, facing landmark, date, start time, duration, and legend. Check that each symbol’s meaning is explained and each sound has a direction or a clear uncertainty mark. If you used distance categories, make sure the key says they are approximate.
Also check whether any arrow suggests movement you did not actually hear, whether you accidentally treated a possible source as certain, or whether overlapping sounds need a masking note. A quick review is enough; the goal is a readable spatial record of one listening period.
When to repeat or change the map
Repeat the map from the same spot when you want to compare listening periods, and label each session separately with its time and conditions. The PWSRCAC lesson suggests repeating sound mapping in different locations, at different times of day, or in different seasons. Those comparisons are meaningful only when the difference is recorded; a map made at another time may reflect changes in activity or weather as well as differences in what you happened to notice. PWSRCAC: “Sound Mapping”
Move to a new position when the task is to map another viewpoint, but start a new map and mark the new listener position and facing direction. If the task is to locate a source precisely, estimate sound pressure, or compare levels, this listening-based map is not enough. Instrumented localization depends on synchronized recordings at known receiver positions and explicit checks on location estimates; that is a different method from a simple observational map. OpenSoundscape: “Acoustic localization”
A useful finished sound map can be small: a fixed listener point, oriented directions, rough distance, a clear legend, concise sound descriptions, and time references. Keep uncertain impressions labelled, and the page will preserve what you heard and where you perceived it during that particular listening period.