Study on the Green Space Patterns and Microclimate Simulation in Typical Urban Blocks in Central China
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The research article is well-drafted, and focuses on: Improving the urban microclimate in urbanized areas. There are a few suggestions that need to be incorporated
1. In the abstract statistical analysis pertaining to research is missing, and currently very generalized.
2. Keep the font uniform in keywords, keywords may be more focused and unique for greater citations.
3. Improve introduction, currently, flow is missing. "If applicable, the software simulation analysis method will be adopted for future research. This method cannot only ensure the accuracy of the experiment but also reduce the cost of the actual measurement". Such lines may be avoided and reframed as it itself shows that the model created has lots of holes. The above lines can be shifted to a conclusion in the way forward section but not in the introduction.
4. Improve figure.1. Scale, North, satellite image used, and spatial extension missing.
5. In Introduction section s. Moreover, as the most basic constituent cell of the urban organism, the urban block is the basic unit for urban planning [9]. the references were used after no. 35 in the previous paragraph. so either you take a new reference or may reframe the sentence. The reference must be used wisely, like out of 46 references, 35 references have been used in the introduction section itself. It gives a monotonous feeling to readers and is more like a literature review article.
6. In the result section the paragraph is too short and the readers will lose interest, make uniform.
7. In many places font sizes are different and maybe having hyperlinked lines, remove such errors throughout the manuscript.
8. In Figure 8-11, the legends are unreadable. please correct it.
9. 3.4 Analysis of microclimate optimization of green space patterns in urban blocks 3.4.1 Analysis of simulation results of different green space patterns 3.4.1.1. a comparison among different patterns. Too many subsections which do not have relevance. Please correct it or reframe it.
10. Figure 13-16. the legends are unreadable. please correct it.
11. Discussion missing please include it.
12. Conclusion too short, a repeat of earlier lines, hyperlinked lines. Way forward missing. Write the entire paragraph again.
Author Response
First of all, thank you very much for giving us the opportunity to revise and for your valuable suggestions. Two reviewers thought that our discussion and conclusion sections need to be in greater detail, and in particular, the discussion needs to be expanded, and concluding conclusions need to be added. We reworked the analysis and discussion (including redoing many of the figures) based on the original experimental results. The results, discussion and conclusions of the paper vary greatly, but these parts still focus on the influence of different parts of green space on the surrounding thermal comfort and how to improve the thermal comfort by improving the green space. We will try our best to make the paper meet your requirements.
Comment 1: The research article is well-drafted, and focuses on: Improving the urban microclimate in urbanized areas. There are a few suggestions that need to be incorporated.
Response 1: Thanks for your recognition. We will try our best to improve the article and make the article meet your requirement.
Comment 2： In the abstract statistical analysis pertaining to research is missing, and currently very generalized.
Response 2: We have added statistical analysis in the abstract.
Comment 3： Keep the font uniform in keywords, keywords may be more focused and unique for greater citations.
Response 3: We are sorry. We have corrected this error. We have carefully checked the font of the whole article. We have made the font uniform.
Comment 4: Improve introduction, currently, flow is missing. "If applicable, the software simulation analysis method will be adopted for future research. This method cannot only ensure the accuracy of the experiment but also reduce the cost of the actual measurement". Such lines may be avoided and reframed as it itself shows that the model created has lots of holes. The above lines can be shifted to a conclusion in the way forward section but not in the introduction.
Response 4: We are sorry. We wanted to say ‘This method not only ensure the accuracy of the experiment but also reduce the cost of the actual measurement’. We wrongly wrote ‘cannot’ in the sentence. We have deleted this sentence. We have added the limitation about the research in the conclusion part.
Comment 5: Improve figure.1. Scale, North, satellite image used, and spatial extension missing.
Response 5: We have added a scale bar, a north arrow, the source of the figure and the spatial extension in figure 1.
Comment 6: In Introduction section s. Moreover, as the most basic constituent cell of the urban organism, the urban block is the basic unit for urban planning [9]. the references were used after no. 35 in the previous paragraph. so either you take a new reference or may reframe the sentence. The reference must be used wisely, like out of 46 references, 35 references have been used in the introduction section itself. It gives a monotonous feeling to readers and is more like a literature review article.
Response 6: We are sorry. We have taken a new reference after reference no.35. We have added more analysis and discussion in the result and discussion as well as conclusion part. Meanwhile, we have cited many relevant articles in our result and discussion part. We hope this article has become more interesting.
Comment 7: In the result section the paragraph is too short and the readers will lose interest, make uniform.
Response 7: We have revised the result and discussion part and conclusion part on a large scale. We have presented our findings in more detail. In addition, we have added many sentences for discussion. The content of these parts has been greatly increased on the original basis.
Comment 8: In many places font sizes are different and maybe having hyperlinked lines, remove such errors throughout the manuscript.
Response 8: We have unified the font size in the full text and deleted hyperlinked lines
Comment 9: In Figure 8-11, the legends are unreadable. please correct it.
Response 9: We have made figure 8-11 again and the legend become larger and readable.
Comment 10: 3.4 Analysis of microclimate optimization of green space patterns in urban blocks 3.4.1 Analysis of simulation results of different green space patterns 3.4.1.1. a comparison among different patterns. Too many subsections which do not have relevance. Please correct it or reframe it.
Response 10: We have rewritten the subtitles. The number of subtitles has decreased. The relevance between the subtitle and the article has been increased.
Comment 11: Figure 13-16. the legends are unreadable. please correct it.
Response 11: We have made figure 8-11 again and the legend become larger and readable.
Comment 12: Discussion missing please include it.
Response 12: In order to meet your requirements, we have rewritten the result and discussion part and added many discussions. Please note that we do not divide the result and discussion into two parts. In Chapter 3, Results and Discussion, we have added a lot of discussion in each section of describing the results. Therefore, our results and discussions are presented in Chapter 3, Result and Discussion, from the beginning to the end.
Comment 13: Conclusion too short, a repeat of earlier lines, hyperlinked lines. Way forward missing. Write the entire paragraph again.
Response 13: We are sorry. We have rewritten the entire conclusion again. We think it is better now. We have added way forward.
Reviewer 2 Report
I found the topic of the study very interesting and in line with the scope of the journal. To improve the overall quality of the manuscript, I have some suggestion/comments as below:
The quality of the figures 1, 2, 3, 7 may be improved, at least in my pdf they are getting a bit distorted.
Section 2.3.2. Feasibility verification of ENVI- met software, 2.3.3 Research on characteristics of microclimate environment of green space patterns in urban blocks are very dense and requires an expert knowledge of the subject. It would be advisable to use a diagram or graph to clarify this.
It is necessary to review the format of the titles, type and font color (lines 524-527).
Table 7 is missing.
Need a better explanation in table 2 to 8. It is hard to understand it and you should comment on the values of indicators, Comfort index values calculated by ENVI-met in summer, Summary of questionnaire survey on human perceptions in summer, Summary of questionnaire survey on human perceptions in winter, Summary of comfort of different green space patterns in blocks with high-rise buildings in summer, Summary of comfort of different green space patterns in blocks with multi-story buildings in summer.
English needs to be revised.
Author Response
First of all, thank you very much for giving us the opportunity to revise and for your valuable suggestions. Two reviewers thought that our discussion and conclusion sections need to be in greater detail, and in particular, the discussion needs to be expanded, and concluding conclusions need to be added. We reworked the analysis and discussion (including redoing many of the figures) based on the original experimental results. The results, discussion and conclusions of the paper vary greatly, but these parts still focus on the influence of different parts of green space on the surrounding thermal comfort and how to improve the thermal comfort by improving the green space. We will try our best to make the paper meet your requirements.
Comment 1: I found the topic of the study very interesting and in line with the scope of the journal. To improve the overall quality of the manuscript, I have some suggestion/comments as below:
Response 1: Thanks for your recognition. We will try our best to improve the article and make the article meet your requirement.
Comment 2: The quality of the figures 1, 2, 3, 7 may be improved, at least in my pdf they are getting a bit distorted.
Response 2: We have made figures 1,2,3,7 again. We think the quality of the figure has been improved.
Comment 3: Section 2.3.2. Feasibility verification of ENVI- met software, 2.3.3 Research on characteristics of microclimate environment of green space patterns in urban blocks are very dense and requires an expert knowledge of the subject. It would be advisable to use a diagram or graph to clarify this.
Response 3: We have made a new graph (figure 4) and a new flow chart (figure 6) to clarify these. In addition. We have rewritten the paragraphs (including add some new paragraphs) to make these sections clear.
Comment 4: It is necessary to review the format of the titles, type and font color (lines 524-527).
Response 4: Thank you for your reminder. I'm sorry that the font size of lines 524-527 is different from that of other parts. We carefully checked the full text to ensure that the title, font size and font color of the article are consistent with the layout requirements of sustainability.
Comment 5: Table 7 is missing.
Response 5: Sorry, there was a small error in the number of the figure. We have carefully checked the numbers of the pictures and tables in the article. We believe that the numbers of all pictures and text descriptions are correct.
Comment 6: Need a better explanation in table 2 to 8. It is hard to understand it and you should comment on the values of indicators, Comfort index values calculated by ENVI-met in summer, Summary of questionnaire survey on human perceptions in summer, Summary of questionnaire survey on human perceptions in winter, Summary of comfort of different green space patterns in blocks with high-rise buildings in summer, Summary of comfort of different green space patterns in blocks with multi-story buildings in summer.
Response 6: We have rewritten these paragraphs again. We have added many explanations. We have made some tables again to make the tables look better.
Comment 7: English needs to be revised.
Response 7: We have worked hard to improve the language expression in the article. We plan to use the polishing service of MDPI. However, the editor told us that they have added a reviewer. We have waited 25 days for another reviewer's opinion. We hope our articles can get your approval and suggestions again. If we can enter the next round of revision and we receive the comments from the fourth reviewer, we will consider using the MDPI polishing service to comprehensively improve the language expression in our articles to meet the publishing requirements.
Reviewer 3 Report
Abstract
Line 3
The name of the city Changsha is mentioned in the first part of the Abstract. But some readers who are not so familiar with the geography of China may not know where Changsha is.
Providing some rough location, i.e., "the eastern part of China" would be helpful for the readers to generate a basic idea of where this study was conducted.
Line 16
By reading the Abstract, it seems that comfort is a key theme which is featured in the subsequent exploration of this research. However, the exact parameters used for quantifying comfort can be provided in the Abstract.
Line 20 to 22
Three types of urban green space configurations are mentioned in these lines. But a minor change in the terms used here is proposed. Readers may not comprehend the differences among these three kinds of spatial arrangements of urban green space.
Line 20 to 26
It seems that a few key quantitative findings can be presented in the Abstract so that readers can interpret the usefulness of the three proposed green space configurations.
Introduction
Line 30
It is believed that the quotation marks for the two terms can be removed. Instead, the terms which are emphasised can be italicised to grab reader's attention.
There are other instances where italic font can be used to emphasise special and important meaning. The authors are encouraged to go through the other sections and make corresponding changes.
Line 47 to 59
The author's argument about the advantages of ENVI-met as a method for microclimatic simulation is well-written. As this study is carried out in central China, the authors may need to cite a few successful cases where ENVI-met has been successfully applied and validated.
The reference studies may not necessarily be based in central China. Neighbouring regions, such as other cities of China, would also be appropriate. The purpose is to prove that such simulation method is practical.
Line 71 to 72
This statement seems to be pointing out a possible limitation of the ENVI-met method. Thus, it may be more appropriate to move it to the Discussion section. When evaluating the methods, perhaps some outputs from the simulation will be helpful.
Materials and methods
Line 80
The presentation of Figure 1 can be improved. Currently, Figure 1 is only showing several districts of the study area. It may be preferable to add an insect to Figure 1 to indicate where the study area is located. Perhaps a simple map of China will be appropriate.
Also, the term “scope of research” can be changed to “study area” if that is the original meaning of the authors.
Line 83 to 118
The choice of PMV, SET and PET is appropriate. But in order to justify the choice of these indicators of thermal comfort, it is suggested that the authors can try reviewing relevant studies featuring the use of these three indicators or indices. Maybe the authors can add a short paragraph in the Introduction section about these indicators.
Results and Discussion
Line 258 to 276
In the first few paragraphs of the Results section, it is mentioned that five main types of greening patterns were identified in this research study. There is detailed elaboration of each type of greening patterns following a general, overall description.
At the same time, some schematic diagrams have been supplied from Figure 4 to Figure 6. Perhaps the authors can try referring to the contents of the figures for a better illustration of the similarities and differences among those types of greening patterns.
Line 275 to 304
In this sub-section, the authors put quite an amount of efforts in verifying the results of the modelling campaigns. But some readers may be interested in seeing a photograph of the setup for the collection of microclimate data for validation.
Also, the sample size of the questionnaire survey seemed somewhat small. For example, in Table 5, only 21 questionnaires were collected for the validation. Therefore, the authors may need to provide some elaboration and justification of the feasibility of using a relatively small sample for the verification of the modelling results.
Line 331 to 485
The results presented in these paragraphs are highly comprehensive. It is believed that the authors have spent a lot of efforts on creating and interpreting the modelling results. However, the enormous amount of the results may cause a lack of depth in the elaboration of individual results.
For instance, there are numerous figures whose caption did not capture the key ideas in the graphics. Actually, it is good to generate the figures from the model. Yet, having more textual explanation about the possible implications that can be drawn from the figures would be good.
Author Response
First of all, thank you very much for giving us the opportunity to revise and for your valuable suggestions. Two reviewers thought that our discussion and conclusion sections need to be in greater detail, and in particular, the discussion needs to be expanded and concluding conclusions need to be added. We reworked the analysis and discussion (including redoing many of the figures) based on the original experimental results. The results, discussion and conclusions of the paper vary greatly, but these parts still focus on the influence of different parts of green space on the surrounding thermal comfort and how to improve the thermal comfort by improving the green space. We will try our best to make the paper meet your requirements.
Abstract
Comment 1: Line 3. The name of the city Changsha is mentioned in the first part of the Abstract. But some readers who are not so familiar with the geography of China may not know where Changsha is.
Providing some rough location, i.e., "the eastern part of China" would be helpful for the readers to generate a basic idea of where this study was conducted.
Response 1: We have provided a rough location of Changsha in the abstract.
Comment 2:
Line 16
By reading the Abstract, it seems that comfort is a key theme which is featured in the subsequent exploration of this research. However, the exact parameters used for quantifying comfort can be provided in the Abstract.
Response 2: We have provided that we used physiological equivalent temperature (PET), predicted mean vote (PMV) and standard effective temperature (SET) to quantify comfort in the abstract.
Comment 3:
Line 20 to 22
Three types of urban green space configurations are mentioned in these lines. But a minor change in the terms used here is proposed. Readers may not comprehend the differences among these three kinds of spatial arrangements of urban green space.
Response 3: We have changed the minor change in the term of five green space patterns in the abstract according to your requirements.
‘Researchers divided the blocks into five types: green space enclosed by buildings type, green space parallel with buildings type, green space centralized in buildings type, green space interspersed in the block type, and green space dispersed in the block type.’
Comment 4:
Line 20 to 26
It seems that a few key quantitative findings can be presented in the Abstract so that readers can interpret the usefulness of the three proposed green space configurations.
Response 4: We have added a few quantitative findings in the last six sentences of the abstract.
Introduction
Comment 5:
Line 30
It is believed that the quotation marks for the two terms can be removed. Instead, the terms which are emphasised can be italicised to grab reader's attention.
There are other instances where italic font can be used to emphasise special and important meaning. The authors are encouraged to go through the other sections and make corresponding changes.
Response 5: Thanks quite a lot for your valuable suggestion. We have deleted the quotation mark. We have remembered italic font can be used to emphasize special and important meanings. We have italicized the words which we think are quite important in our article to grab readers’ attention.
Comment 6:
Line 47 to 59
The author's argument about the advantages of ENVI-met as a method for microclimatic simulation is well-written. As this study is carried out in central China, the authors may need to cite a few successful cases where ENVI-met has been successfully applied and validated.
The reference studies may not necessarily be based in central China. Neighbouring regions, such as other cities of China, would also be appropriate. The purpose is to prove that such simulation method is practical.
Response 6: We have added a whole paragraph in the introduction part to show the successful cases where ENVI-met has been successfully applied and validated. The paragraph is the fourth paragraph of the introduction.
Comment 7:
Line 71 to 72
This statement seems to be pointing out a possible limitation of the ENVI-met method. Thus, it may be more appropriate to move it to the Discussion section. When evaluating the methods, perhaps some outputs from the simulation will be helpful.
Response 7: We are sorry, this is a slip of pen. We wanted to say ‘This method not only ensures the accuracy of the experiment but also reduces the cost of the actual measurement.’ We wrongly added a ‘can’ before ‘not’.
Materials and methods
Comment 8:
Line 80
The presentation of Figure 1 can be improved. Currently, Figure 1 is only showing several districts of the study area. It may be preferable to add an insect to Figure 1 to indicate where the study area is located. Perhaps a simple map of China will be appropriate.
Also, the term “scope of research” can be changed to “study area” if that is the original meaning of the authors.
Response 8: We have made figure 1 again. We have added a simple map of China and a simple map of Hunan province of urban agglomeration in central China. We have changed the term from “scope of research” to “study area”.
Comment 9:
Line 83 to 118
The choice of PMV, SET and PET is appropriate. But in order to justify the choice of these indicators of thermal comfort, it is suggested that the authors can try reviewing relevant studies featuring the use of these three indicators or indices. Maybe the authors can add a short paragraph in the Introduction section about these indicators.
Response 9: We have added a long paragraph in the introduction part to review relevant studies featuring the use of these indicators or indices. It is the last but one paragraph of the introduction part.
Results and Discussion
Comment 10:
Line 258 to 276
In the first few paragraphs of the Results section, it is mentioned that five main types of greening patterns were identified in this research study. There is detailed elaboration of each type of greening patterns following a general, overall description.
At the same time, some schematic diagrams have been supplied from Figure 4 to Figure 6. Perhaps the authors can try referring to the contents of the figures for a better illustration of the similarities and differences among those types of greening patterns.
Response 10: We have added detailed elaboration of each type of greening pattern. You can see these in the 3.1 part. We have also referred to the figures for a better illustration of the similarities and differences among those types of greening patterns.
Comment 11:
Line 275 to 304
In this sub-section, the authors put quite an amount of efforts in verifying the results of the modelling campaigns. But some readers may be interested in seeing a photograph of the setup for the collection of microclimate data for validation.
Also, the sample size of the questionnaire survey seemed somewhat small. For example, in Table 5, only 21 questionnaires were collected for the validation. Therefore, the authors may need to provide some elaboration and justification of the feasibility of using a relatively small sample for the verification of the modelling results.
Response 11: We have added a photo to show the setup for the collection of microclimate data for validation. It is the figure 3.
Sorry, the table we made may not be quite clear. In addition, we may not describe it clearly. In Table 5, the sample size of the questionnaire is not 21. In Table 5, 39 questionnaires were collected at observation point a in three different time periods (10:00 to 11:00, 15:00-16:00 and 18:00-19:00). 62 questionnaires were collected at observation point b in three different time periods. The total sample is 101. In other words, Each questionnaire obtained from each observation point in each time period can be compared with the human perception of the corresponding point in the corresponding time period according to each thermal comfort index (PET, PMV, SET). The human perception obtained according to each thermal comfort index can be compared 101 times with the questionnaire surveys. We have made the table again and improved the explanation.
We also point out that the difference between the sample size of this study and that of similar studies is small, and the sample size is reasonable in the article. We have added references to relevant studies that we have referred to.
Comment 12:
Line 331 to 485
The results presented in these paragraphs are highly comprehensive. It is believed that the authors have spent a lot of efforts on creating and interpreting the modelling results. However, the enormous amount of the results may cause a lack of depth in the elaboration of individual results.
For instance, there are numerous figures whose caption did not capture the key ideas in the graphics. Actually, it is good to generate the figures from the model. Yet, having more textual explanation about the possible implications that can be drawn from the figures would be good.
Response 12: In order to meet your requirements, we have rewritten the result and discussion part and added many discussions. Please note that we do not divide the result and discussion into two parts. In Chapter 3, Results and Discussion, we have added a lot of discussion in each section of describing the results. Therefore, our results and discussions are presented in Chapter 3, Result and Discussion, from the beginning to the end.
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
The revised version is well-written, scientifically conducted and the conclusions were comprehensively supported by the data, therefore, the revised version can be accept in present form.
