Using Multivariate Statistical Methods to Analyze High-Quality Bicycle Path Service Systems: A Case Study of Popular Bicycle Paths in Taiwan

Main concerns:

1.     One of my main "concerns" is connected with termin "bicycle lane". I think that this termin is not suitable - as I could find out from article this should be replaced with "bicycle paths / roads / route". More, if different types of bicycle infrastructure apply - this should be clearly marked / add an additional description. Also, some photos of different locations / different types of bicycle infrastructure observed will help with understanding the problems / proposed solutions.

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Text has been revised as per suggestions. Bicycle lane was replaced by bicycle path. We also modified Table 1 with the comments of another reviewer and tried to link to new Figure 2.

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1)     Title (page 1, line 3 through line 4).

2)     Add Figure 1. (page 5)

3)     History… section in page 3, Table 1.

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1. In the introduction part, you mention data about Taiwan bicycle roads in 2015. I would suggest you to update the data, since we are in 2020.

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Text has been revised as per suggestions.

This study provides a set of evaluation procedures and uses 2015 data as analytical cases. Due to the difficulty of collecting data, professionals and research teams are required. The latest issue of data is currently under investigation. Thanks for the reviewer for your precious suggesting that we have changed the current status of bicycle paths in Taiwan to be updated to 2020 and combined with the current analytical results.

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1)     INTRODUCTION section and History… section, page 1-5.

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2. In line 62, you report that you analysed the data mathematically. I would rather use the term statistically.

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Thank you very much. This section has been revised.

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1)     INTRODUCTION section in page 2, line 64.

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3. In line 86 you mention a LOHAS lane. Please, explain what does that mean.

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Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

LOHAS, Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability. The speed of the vehicles was maintained at <10 km/h. We adopted the LOHAS travel approach to the on-site experience and observations of ecological systems, recreational attractions, service areas, and tourist service centers along the routes.

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1)     History… section (page 3, line 101 through line 104).

2)     Materials and Methods section (page 6, line 176 through line 181).

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4. In the Materials and Methods section, I am missing some of the main research design areas: research problem, data collection technique, target population, sample frame and sampling, description of the sample, used methods of data analysis. Please, restructure the section. At this point, to me, it is not clear who completed the survey. Was it just the 10 professional cyclist? If so, the number of units is too small to conduct factor analysis (there should be at least 7 units for each indicator used in the factor analysis). If you have a case of just 10 units, qualitative methods for data analysis should be used.

Reply

Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Detailed statements were added and elaborated in the section of Materials and Methods in page 5, line 164 through line 171, and page 6, line 186 through line 190, and page 7, line 201 through line 202.

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1)     Materials and Methods section (page 5, line 164 through line 171, and page 6, line 186 through line 190, and page 7, line 201 through line 202).

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5. What is presented in Table 3? There is no introduction nor discussion with interpretation of this table in the paper.

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Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Detailed statements were added and elaborated in the section of Materials and Methods section in page 7, line 201 through line 202. And deleted Table 3.

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1)     Materials and Methods section (page 7, line 201 through line 202).

Main concerns:

6. Correlational coefficients, factor analysis and cluster analysis cannot be computed on n=10. Please, use qualitative data analysis.

Reply

Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Detailed statements were added and elaborated in the section of Materials and Methods section in page 5, line 164 through line 171, and page 6, line 186 through line 190, and page 7, line 201 through line 202. Brief description, this study has been defined as 11 indicators, 30 plots, and 330 parameters through experts’ consultation.

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1)     Materials and Methods section (page 5, line 164 through line 171, and page 6, line 186 through line 190, and page 7, line 201 through line 202).

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1. 14-27

abstract unclear, no method mentioned, result description not understandable, what does explanatory power means and what do the numbers tell us? 23/24 nonsense

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Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Detailed statements were added and elaborated in the section of Abstract.

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1)     Abstract section (page 1, line 16 through line 18, and line 23

2)     The original sentence in line 23-24 was deleted.

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2. 28 keywords can be improved

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Thank you very much. This section has been revised.

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1)     Keywords line 27.

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3. 37 3 mio people out of what to understand the number in its context

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Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

This section has been revised and updated the new data until 2020.

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1)     Introduction section (page 2, line 46 through line 47)

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4. 41 4,500 km bicycle lanes > compare to motorlanes to understand relevance

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Thank you very much.

The total length of roads in Taiwan is 43,206 kilometers (until 2017). The ratio of bicycle paths to all motor lanes roads is 16.2%.

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1)     Introduction section (page 2, line 51)

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5. 41 connect urban and rural AREAS

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Thank you very much. This section has been revised.

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1)     Introduction section (page 2, line 52)

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6. 46 is LOHAS an established term?

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Most riders in Taiwan understand the meaning of LOHAS and established the Taiwan Lohas Bicycle Association in 2012.

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7. 47-54 move to after 35

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Thank you very much. Has been revised.

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1)     Introduction section (page 1-page 2, line 35 through line 45)

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8. 61 how were they selected? give more information as "covering a total of ...km of the Taiwanese bicycle lanes"

Reply

Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Detailed statements were added and elaborated in the section of Materials and Methods section in page 5, line 164 through line 171, and Table 1. In page 3, line 110.

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1)     Materials and Methods section in page 5, line 164 through line 171.

2)     Table 1. In page 3, line 110.

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9. 62 were examined by whom?

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Thank you very much. This section has been revised.

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1)     Introduction section (page 2, line 64 through line 65)

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10. 63 causal relationships of what?

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Thank you very much. This part has been revised.

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1)     Introduction section (page 2, line 64 through line 65)

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11. 72-75 out of scope here > delete or move to chapter 1

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Thank you very much. This part has been revised (moving and merging into the sentence).

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1)     Introduction section (page 1-2, line 35 through line 45)

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12. 78 in total or annually?

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Thank you very much. This section has been revised. (annually)

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1)     History… section (page 2, line 76).

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13. 82 more description needed about origin

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Thank you very much.

Taiwan’s Ministry of Transportation and Communications has been executed the round-island bicycle path upgrading plan, focusing on the construction of international bicycle routes and characteristic tourism activities, the development of localized bicycle in-depth tourism, bicycle round-the-island road network optimization, as well as safety improvement as the three main works.

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1)     History… section (page 2, line 79 through line 83).

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14. 84-87 rephrase and connect to the right context

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Thank you very much. This section has been revised.

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1)     History… section (page 3, line 101 through line 104).

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15. 109 table 1 > needs major re-structuring, should be called "Classification of the bicycle..."; see over categories and make coherent; include lenght as a descriptive term, use tick-boxes for the main differentiation criteria as recreation, envir. education, local transp. and multiple-day usage; use class 1/2/3 as descriptive terms (with recreative and commuting eventually as sub-categories to the three classes and describe recreative and commuting in main text instead); connect table 1 to the 30 selected lanes in TW and classify those accordingly)

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Thank you very much. This section has been revised.

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1)     Table 1. In page 3, line 110.

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16. 122/123 how many own a bike/capita?

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Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Detailed statements were added and elaborated in the section of History… section (page 4, line 127 through line 130).

According to a detailed survey (2016) by the Ministry of Transport of Taiwan, each household has 1.24 bicycles on average; it is estimated that Taiwanese have 10.16 million bicycles, 460,000 electric bicycles and 140,000 electric assisted bicycles.

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1)     History… section (page 4, line 127 through line 130).

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17. 131/132 how many bikes to rent are around in parallel and how many users per capita?

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Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Detailed statements were added and elaborated in the section of History… section (page 4, line 140 through line 143).

The Giant company bicycle rental station beside the 30-kilometer bicycle path around the lake, providing with 300 bicycles, and there are about 26 rental companies occur in the surrounding area, each providing with about 62 bicycles. All bicycle can be rented twice a day and can be provided 0.35 bicycles per person (10,731 visitors per day).

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1)     History… section (page 4, line 140 through line 143).

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18. 142/143 explain data collection method in detail? what is a bicycle survey team? (assembling=wring term!) And: did the 10 bikers do observations or distribute surveys or are they the respondents to your survey? All is totally unclear.

Reply

Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Detailed statements were added and elaborated in the section of Materials and Methods section in page 6, line 186 through line 190, and page 7, line 201 through line 202).

The research team members accompany the investigation throughout the entire process. However, they are not professional cycling teams. After the investigation area is over, a meeting must be held to determine all parameters, and the approval score shall be prevailed, not an average value. The meeting discusses all substantive issues and examines the in the surveyed area, whether there are the same problems, finally, gradually to be completed 30 popular bicycles.

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1)     Materials and Methods section in page 6, line 186 through line 190, and page 7, line 201 through line 202.

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19. 144/145: figure 1 is an unsuitable picture. But it would be very benificial to provide i pic of TW with the 30 selected lanes (again: why are those chosen), correctly classified and drawn as a LANE in the pic (where do they go in TW?), eventually differentiated in colour to illustrate different class with sub-characteristics

Reply

Thank you very much. This section has been redrawn to be become Figure 2.

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1)     Add Figure 2. (page 6)

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20. 147-157 Data collection very vague described. needs major complements and improvement

Reply

Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Detailed statements were added and elaborated in the section of Materials and Methods section in page 5, line 164 through line 171, and page 6, line 186 through line 190, and page 7, line 201 through line 202. Brief description, this study defined 11 indicators, 30 plots, and 330 parameters were defined through expert consultation.

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1)     Materials and Methods section (page 5, line 164 through line 171, and page 6, line 186 through line 190, and page 7, line 201 through line 202).

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21. 151 Lohas travel approach: not explained

Reply

Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

LOHAS, Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability. The speed of the vehicles was maintained at <10 km/h. We adopted the LOHAS travel approach to the on-site experience and observations of ecological systems, recreational attractions, service areas, and tourist service centers along the routes.

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1)     History… section (page 3, line 101 through line 104).

Materials and Methods section (page 6, line 176 through line 181).

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22. 153 which data collected?

Reply

Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Materials and Methods section in page 6, line 176 through line 190, and page 7-8, Table 2.

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1)     Materials and Methods section (page 6, line 176 through line 190

2)     Table 2. In page 7-8, line 229.

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23. 166 which survey? how did it take place? what was done? participants? respondents?

Reply

Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Materials and Methods section in page 6, line 176 through line 190, and page 7-8, Table 2.

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1)     Materials and Methods section (page 6, line 176 through line 190.

2)     Table 2. In page 7-8, line 229.

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24. 170-189 > general text, not applied to this concrete analysis!

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Thank you very much. This section has been revised.

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1)     Materials and Methods section (page 7, line 203 through line 220.

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25. 192 Is the evaluation of sightseeing potential the expressed research aim? That was not mentioned before!? 

Reply

Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Detailed statements were added and elaborated in the section of Materials and Methods section in page 5, line 164 through line 171, and page 6, line 186 through line 190, and page 7, line 201 through line 202. Brief description, this study, detected 11 indicators, 30 plots, and 330 parameters, were defined through experts’ consultation.

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1)     Materials and Methods section (page 5, line 164 through line 171, and page 6, line 186 through line 190, and page 7, line 201 through line 202).

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26. 161 which table? I guess table 2

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Thank you very much. Yes.

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1)     Table 2. In page 7-8, line 229.

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27. 199 table 2 needs major improvements because the scores do not correspond to each other and partly lay on different levels resp. are based on indifferent quality-criteria:

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Thank you very much.

The rigorous value has been used to solve this problem.

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1)     Materials and Methods section (page 7, line 201 through line 202).

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28. v2:should rather be something like: from 1 homogeneous/boring to 4 rich and varied. an urban zone can have a great scenery

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Thank you very much. This section has been revised, and the concept of the original evaluation is improved.

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1)     Results section, Table 2. (page 7-8, line 229).

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29. v4: isn't access the main criteria rather than the choice to select?

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Thank you very much.

According to on-site surveys, it can be shown that when there are multiple rental shops on site, they are usually popular attractions; where single rental shops occur, it means that the popularity goes downtrend; and the places with sharing-bicycles are usually not the most popular attractions. The locations of self-preparation required usually have fewer tourists.

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30. v5: the qualities are different for different target groups! gentle is a high score for those who need it, challenging is a high score for sportsmen

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Thank you very much.

The setting of this research is about bicycle paths suitable for the whole family.

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31. v7: is varying surfaces a high quality?

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Thank you very much. We have added explanatory text to avoid confusion. All parameters need to be considered with construction quality

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1)     Results section, Table 2. (page 7-8, line 229).

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32. v9: is existence of service not rather the main criterium?

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Thank you very much.

The main study of this research is the bicycle paths. Others such as visitor centers and toilets are part of the service system.

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33. v10: attention, this quality is a political question. eventually you want people to come by public transport and not by car

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Thank you very much.

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34. 223-236 the description of results does not lead to any further understanding when it remains at this purely abstract number-level

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Thank you very much. This section has been revised.

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1)     Results section in page 9, line 249 through line 260).

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35. 270 no bold values used in the table

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Thank you very much. This section has been revised.

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1)     Results section, Table 5., page 10.

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36. 272/273 how do you know?

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Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Detailed statements were added and elaborated in the section of Results section in page 11, line 302 through line 305. Our survey team has many years of riding experiences. In the process of the survey, we used not only substance surveys, but also used dialogues and exchanges with local bicycle friends, in order to facilitate the follow-up overall evaluation. This research is not a purely quantitative research, some parts of it have been added to the qualitative research.

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1)     Results section in page 11, line 302 through line 305.

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37. 277-280 this conclusion can be questionned

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Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Detailed statements were added and elaborated in the section of Results section in page 11, line 294 through line 295. Explain that the existing and abandoned railways or their surrounding environmental utilization are favored by the people.

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1)     Results section in page 11, line 294 through line 295.

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38. 281-283 not understandable

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Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Detailed statements were added and elaborated in the section of Results section in page 11, line 296 through line 298. Bicycle path can be designed to increase the degree of riding variation, and the beautiful scenery along the route is selected, which is easy to improve the satisfaction of riding.

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1)     Results section in page 11, line 296 through line 298.

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39. 293-303 not understandable to me

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Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Detailed statements were added and elaborated in the section of Results section in page 11-12, line 311 through line 314. Through cluster analysis, we can analyze the clustering situation of the current assessment paths, and the results can be shown the current situation of bicycle paths in Taiwan, not only using by the design situation. Only by examining the inherent limitations of each type of path can we have a way to customize the design enhancement method.

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Results section in page 11-12, line 311 through line 314.

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40. 303-360 how comes the differentiation between value-added and essential factors? how how is the weight/hierarchical order between them?

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Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Detailed statements were added and elaborated in the section of Conclusions section in page 13, line 329 through line 332. Six essential factors are necessary, and each bicycle path service system could be needed to consider. The value-added factors can be considered their own limitations and resource allocation, as well as their different levels of construction and maintenance to be implemented.

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1)     Conclusions section in page 13, line 329 through line 332.

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41. 317 EF3 you mean Maintenance

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Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Detailed statements were added and elaborated in the section of Conclusions section in page 13, line 340 through line 342. Cause by their have good maintenance because of their popularity.

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1)     Conclusions section in page 13, line 340 through line 342.

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42. 326 EF5 Access to bikes and service is the main point here

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Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Detailed statements were added and elaborated in the section of Conclusions section in page 13, line 357 through line 358. Equipment provision and maintenance are the main functions.

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1)     Conclusions section in page 13, line 357 through line 358.

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43. 332 EF6 more in the sense of Signage and information system

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Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Detailed statements were added and elaborated in the section of Conclusions section in page 13, line 362. Signage and information system are the main functions.

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Conclusions section in page 13, line 362.

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44. 336 VAF 1 Safety

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Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Detailed statements were added and elaborated in the section of Conclusions section in page 13, line 364. This is beneficial to increasing cyclists’ satisfaction and safety.

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Conclusions section in page 13, line 364.

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45. 352 again: all based just on 10 expert surveys? Totally unclear

Reply

Thanks for your valuable and distinguished comments.

Detailed statements were added and elaborated in the section of Materials and Methods section in page 5, line 164 through line 171, and page 6, line 186 through line 190, and page 7, line 201 through line 202. Brief description, this study defined 11 indicators, 30 plots, and 330 parameters were defined through expert consultation.

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1)     Materials and Methods section (page 5, line 164 through line 171, and page 6, line 186 through line 190, and page 7, line 201 through line 202).