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Coppet, Vaud, Switzerland (24 Heures, Fre) – Anti-noise walls along the autoroute are increasingly familiar as the federal government and cantons work to reduce unacceptably high noise levels. Less common: a high-tech plastic wall put up by a home-owner, at her expense, to reduce noise from the lake road, but this is what Amalia Ciriza in Coppet has done. The village is not 100 percent happy about it.

Ciriza chose to have the wall specially built for her by a French firm that specializes in autoroute walls, reports 24 Heures, because she wanted to build a second house on her property and noise regulations required her to protect it. The projects were approved, but the commune’s town manager told the newspaper that there won’t be another one like it – the plans never mentioned that it would be made of plastic. Meanwhile, the neighbours have planted hedges to hide it.