Morphology of Warsaw City Structure Using Urban Indexes and GIS Tools

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Dear all,

Thank you for the opportunity to read your paper.

I think the article needs to be restructured and clarified in many respects. I think the methodology followed is also very innovative. I think the objective of the work as well as the novelty is unclear.

The below aspects should be addressed by the author before publication.

SPECIFIC COMMENTS:

- I think that the ABSTRACT should be improved by briefly stating the methodology followed, the novelty factor of the paper and avoiding starting with “The article presents an attempt”. A new tool? What kind of tool? It’s necessary to specify right away.

- Introduction: This section also needs to be deepened and improved. For example: from line 66, it’s better to specify these indicators in order to explain in more detail later which gap in the literature is being covered.

- It is unclear whether this section is part of the methodology or the introduction. If so, I would put it as a subsection of it.

- Line 142-143: So, what methodology will be used? The description of these two methods should be moved to the introduction if they are indeed not the methods used in this work. And leave in the methodology only the work in GIS.

I would move the purpose to the final section of the Introduction and also the section 2.3

- The results need to be presented more clearly because it is confusing what the contribution of novelty actually is. More emphasis should be placed on the algorithm.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

The paper “aims to describe the spatial structure of a selected test part of the city of Warsaw with the use of the rural-to-urban transect tool adapted to the specificity of development of Polish cities” (lines 172-174).

According to the statement, the purpose is double: (1) describe spatial structure of Warsaw and (2) present the adaptation and automation of the transect tool to the specificity of Polish cities (otherwise, if it is not automated then it is not a tool). Regarding the first part of the purpose, my comments are mainly focused on clarifying some details (which will be presented later). However, I have big concerns regarding its second part. Please, see them below:

• If you speak about a tool, I expect that you will explain its need, discuss its design, test its accuracy, reliability, and justify its usefulness by high efficiency. In the article, I found parts regarding its need, while its design was presented in Figure 5 and extensively discussed in the Materials and methods. However, I lack the information on the latter three aspects, which correspond to the technical characteristics of the tool: its accuracy, reliability, and efficiency. How fast is the tool implemented in ArcGIS Model Builder compared to operator-made analysis in ArcGIS without Model Builder? What is the structure of the attribute tables of the entry data? What happens if the tool is run on a different machine? How many times the tool was run? Were there any failures? Etc. Without describing the technical aspects of the tool functioning, the article is a simple characterization of the morphology of Warsaw City. That is why, my recommendation here is either to adjust the paper’s title and purpose to correspond to the presented results or to significantly enhance the article by presenting and discussing technical aspects of the “tool” according to the questions above, but not limited just to them.

Regarding the first part of the article’s purpose, I have the following comments:

• Line 99: The subchapter title is not clear: „2.1. Transect and spacemate – similarities, differences and things in common”. Why using in parallel „similarities” and „things in common” is justified in this title?
• Figures are too small and the text on them is barely visible. Especially, figures 1, 6, 7, and 9.
• Line 147: Although GIS is quite a popular abbreviation, I would recommend using the full version at the first mentioning in the text. The same recommendation applies to all the abbreviations, especially those, which are specific to the field represented by the author, such as FAR/GSI (Figure 6), DPZ (line 121) etc.
• Line 209: instead of triple points there should be something, which is missing.
• Formula 1: What do variables n and k mean? All signs should be explained. This recommendation applies to all formulas.
• Lines 339-340: “The values of this indicator will be in the range [0;∞]. The lowest possible value, i.e. 1…”. It is not clear which is the lowest possible value. It should be corrected.
• Figure 6: Figure title is non-informative. What do FAR and GSI mean? Which index is on which axis? The title should be reformulated. Figures should be self-contained, to be understandable without additional explanations in the text.
• Lines 394-402: In the Results section, the research outcomes should be commented on and explained. All explanations of the method itself (how it works, how it was developed etc.) should be placed in the methodology section.
• Figure 8: The figure partly covers its title
• In the discussion section, you should present your output against other published results, reports and articles. But this section contains no citations. I recommend enhancing it by comparing your findings with other similar ones.

I did not comment positive parts of the article, but there are enough of them to recommend the paper for publication in the journal. However, taking into consideration the above-mentioned drawback, I recommend a major revision of the article before acceptance.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

Spatial analyzes, due to their complexity and multi-aspect nature, require the division of space into smaller territorial units. Depending on the division criterion, conditioned primarily by the aim of the study, various spatial structures and relations between them can be obtained. These forms are determined using various techniques and tools. The main aim of the study was to use GIS tools that enable the presentation of spatial relations to describe the structure of a selected part of the city. An additional advantage of this tool is the ability to use widely available spatial data. In my opinion, this is a very interesting and important research problem.

The article is written on a good scientific level. The exposed aim of the research and the well-outlined methodological context deserve attention. The research method has been described clearly and understandably.

The structure of the manuscript is also correct. However, in my opinion, the introduction should be supplemented with a description of the article structure (in the last paragraph).

The content of the manuscript is consistent with its title. The author also cited many literature sources, which I consider very valuable. In terms of editing, I think that hyperlinks should be removed.

In addition, my other comments are as follows:

- The quality of Fig. 5, 6, and 7 should be improved,

- Formula (2) should be corrected by removing the last part of the equation (on the right) and replacing the designation PC, which is not explained below this formula, with „PZixlki”. This form will be easier to understand, and the index appearing in the sum („i”) will be used in the formula. The same remark applies to the formula (3),

- In Fig. 6, 7, and 8 the description of the axles should be completed,

- The publication should end with a section called „Conclusions”. Although it currently contains a discussion of the results, a summary is missing. You should either include an appropriate fragment of the text at the end of the article or change the name of the last chapter.

- Author should also consider adding units in which the analyzed variables are expressed in the formulas.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Dear authors,

The effort to improve the paper is evident. Thank you for considering my comments. I have no more comments and I think the paper is ready for publication in the present form.

Reviewer 2 Report

Dear author,

Thank you for addressing all my comments! I have no more comments and would recommend the article for publication in the present form.