An Urban Regeneration Planning Scheme for the Souq Waqif Heritage Site of Doha
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
This paper has some good points and provides an interesting study of a transit-oriented development from outside of the usual Western contexts. However, it needs some substantial restructuring and expansion before it can be published. There are three main areas where the paper needs considerably more work and reflection on what the paper is intended to convey in relation to its overall argument.
First, it is not clear what this study involves. In some parts of the paper it appears to be a critique of existing government policies and plans and an attempt to provide a set of recommendations as to how the plans could be altered and improved. In other parts of the paper it seems to be actually setting out the policy and plans before they have been adopted by government and/or implemented. Some clarity is needed on this so that the reader is clear as to whether the paper is critiquing an existing plan or whether it is outlining what the plan should be. It would also help to have the aims of the paper made clear in the introduction. These are set out in the research design section, but it would help the reader if these could be made clear early on and then the paper structured around addressing the research questions. The authors should also consider what they are trying to convey with the paper – what is the main message and what are the takeaway points for the reader?
Second, the paper needs to integrate the themes of transit-oriented development and cultural heritage. At present these are not linked together adequately and it is not clear how the TOD scheme can or will address the issues of identity, belonging, heritage etc. given that the focus is on parks, gardens and building design (e.g. see quote at line 226). More detail is needed here for context – e.g. what are the socio-cultural characteristics of Arab society mentioned in the paper and how will/can these be addressed through the TOD scheme?
Third, the paper lacks any detail of the research design and research method or any evidence of data collection and analysis. The diagram states that the latter involved a mix of seminars, a survey, focus groups and semi-structured interviews, but we need details of these – how many of each, who was involved, what questions were asked, numbers of respondents, times and dates, composition by sex, age, income, how were the data analysed etc. etc.
Author Response
Please refer to attached file.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
Dear Authors,
Check out the citations in the text do not use the first name in the parentheses. Also, check out the language.
Author Response
Please refer to attached file.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
This is a very interesting work, please find some minor comments below.
- Figures. The font on all figures are super small, it's hard to read it, please revise accordingly.
- Conclusion and discussion. This section needs to be split into two sections. More discussion is needed. Please compare your study with past studies to highlight your contributions. In addition to summarize your research results, please also include the limitations and possible future research directions in your conclusion section.
- Section 6 is very short, you can combine it into other sections or improve it with more information. Either one is ok.
Author Response
Please refer to attached file.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
The authors have made substantial changes to the original paper and have addressed my concerns. It would be useful to have a native English speaker read the paper and correct the English usage/language.
