The majority of noise is not from the ICE itself but from the noise of the tires on the pavement. EVs have the same issues as all other vehicles.

EVs are now required to make a noise at low speeds and at high speeds tires dominate. The best option is fewer cars, the second best option is lower speed limits (with enforcement!).

Only at very low speeds, past 30km/h (18mph) the noise from the tyres starts to approach or surpass the noise from the engine so they're nearly equivalent.

There are efforts to attack the car tyre noise problem by grinding groves into the surface of the road. it's called "Next Generation Concrete Surface" I remember hearing about it on the "Twenty Thousand Hertz" podcast [0] [0] https://www.20k.org/episodes/sonicutopia

We had grooved concrete here some decades ago. Luckily they got rid of those as the noise was much worse than normal surfaces.

Yes, but then there are few idiots with modified cars (or most motorbikes in general) that are orders of magnitudes louder and can be heard from kilometers away.

We live on a semi-main road. Normal engines aren’t really noticeable or annoying. Nearly all of the road noise is generated by tires with a fraction coming from large truck engines and vehicles with broken exhausts.

Tires are shockingly loud.

Smooth roads really help with this, but no one seems to care

Smooth roads come with grip problems - especially in the rain.