Constantly Tracking and Investigating People’s Physical, Psychological, and Thermal Responses in Relation to Park Strolling in a Severe Cold Region of China—A Case Study of Stalin Waterfront Park
, Chenxin Hu 1, Caiyi Zhao 1 and Haoshun Wang 2,3
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Line 39: change "get to know...exchange of views" to meet and socialize with friends and acquaintances.
40: Change to "With increased pressures of work and life..."
66-67: "previous urban planners and designers are commonly not well-acquainted with human comfort". Based on what criteria? The factors governing human comfort have been known for. along time. Planners take into account a variety of issues including thermal comfort when designing urban spaces.
81: "Water body also be confirmed that could better the thermal environment." Change to "Water bodies have also been shown to improve thermal comfort by retaining warm air on cold days and cooling the air during hot weather."
88: change "often lasting..." to "often last for longer periods of time."
164-165: change to "paper questionnaires..."
565: "this means..."
Author Response
Dear editors and reviewers,
Thank you very much for your comments and professional advices. These opinions help to improve academic rigor of our article. Base on your suggestions and requests we have made correct modifications on the revised manuscript. We hope that our work can be improved again. Furthermore, we would like to show the details as follows:
Reviewer 1#
- Line 39: change “get to know…exchange of views” to meet and socialize with friends and acquaintances.
Line 40: Change to “With increased pressures of work and life…”.
Line 81: “Water body also be confirmed that could better the thermal environment.” Change to “Water bodies have also been shown to improve thermal comfort by retaining warm air on cold days and cooling the air during hot weather.”
Line 88: change “often lasting…” to “often last for longer periods of time.”
Line 164-165: change to “paper questionnaires…”
Line 565: “this means…”
The author’s answer: Thank you very much for your careful proofreading of the English grammar mistakes in this article. We confirm that your suggestions are precious and helpful. And we modify these mistakes which you mentioned earnestly.
- “previous urban planners and designers are commonly not well-acquainted with human comfort”. Based on what criteria? The factors governing human comfort have been known for. Along time. Planners take into account a variety of issues including thermal comfort when designing urban spaces.
The author’s answer: We really appreciate the professional reviewer’s suggestion. Indeed, previous studies show that scholars have launched a series of related studies[13-17], including research on public spaces[18-19], city squares [20-22], streets[23], campuses[24-29], central business districts[30] as well as residential communities[31-33] in order to create comfortable urban open spaces. However, as for some special public spaces like the park, it is inevitable that the visual aesthetic quality of the landscape, including the beauty and exuberance of vegetation, has always been one of the primary focuses in a majority of park design [48]. For example, Stalin Waterfront Park which situated along the Songhua River and was 1750m long in the form of a strip. The park contains three leisure paths. In order to make sure the scenery view of Songhua River for tourists, just one side of the path planting trees as a shelter and the other side where near the river bared to prevent sight block (Sight-seeing path, shown in Fig.1). In addition, because of the frequent rising and falling of water level (111.7 to 117.5m), one path named hydrophilic path in park is made of cement considering the safety and it is bare without any planting. So, 2 of 3 paths in this park ignore the thermal comfort without trees because of aesthetics as well as safety. In this study, we conduct a series of experiments to resolve this contradiction. According to the results of our constant investments, the thermal environment could be improved by offering shelters such as trees or artificial landscape facilities locally. Our suggestions in this article provide an all-around approach considering thermal comfort, aesthetics, and safety.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
-Please state what scientific gaps this study fills up.
-The abstract should give quantitative findings.
-The authors should remove irrelevant references
-The result analysis is too simple, lacking in-depth findings.
-The authors should provide high-resolution figures.
-The authors should emphasize meaningful results that can be used in practice. For example, the comfortable temperature range.
-It is suggested that the authors should compare this study’s findings with those of existing studies.
-The conclusions should be concise and give quantitative findings.
-The English language must be improved.
Author Response
Dear editors and reviewers,
Thank you very much for your comments and professional advices. These opinions help to improve academic rigor of our article. Base on your suggestions and requests we have made correct modifications on the revised manuscript. We hope that our work can be improved again. Furthermore, we would like to show the details as follows:
Reviewer 2#
- Please state what scientific gapsthis study fills up.
The author’s answer: Outdoor thermal environment assessment is critical and helpful in improving the space’s thermal quality. A comfortable outdoor space could attract more citizens to take part in outdoor activities and decrease energy consumption. Therefore, more and more studies were carried out to evaluate the outdoor thermal environment by TSV, TCV, and TAV assessment indicators. However, there are also some deficiencies that could be improved.
(1) Transient thermal environment assessments are not accurate and practical. For example, citizens’ outdoor activities such as resting, recreation and physical exercises, etc., often last a period. This means that the outdoor environment has a constant impact on people rather than a short-term one. Pui Kwan Cheung’s research suggested that most respondents (94.6%) accepted the thermal environment at the moment of the interview, whereas only 69.0% of them found it acceptable to stay there for one more hour [64]. Therefore, this study applies the method by constantly recording subjects’ responses for 2 hours (1 hour for an outdoor test and 1 hour for an indoor test). Results showed that TSV, TCV and TAV should be measured only if when subjects stay outside for 45-55 minutes so that subjects’ thermal responses vote to reach the key point (peak or bottom).
(2) Objective indicators such as different body segments local skin temperatures are involved. Previous studies about outdoor thermal environment assessment are carried out based on ASHARE Standards, and typically, these studies selected TSV, TCV and TAV as indicators according to ASHARE’s recommendation. However, these indicators are all subjective data which was obtained by interview. This study involved objective factors as supplements and the correlation between objective skin temperature and subjective thermal sensation vote is explored. Besides, some suggestions are proposed to improve human thermal sensation (TS) in hot summer and cold winter by decreasing or increasing some special body segments’ skin temperature.
(3) Mean skin temperature calculating formula used to be complex or inaccurate. Mean skin temperature calculated by appropriate parts of the body skin temperature can predict thermal sensation accurately. The previous formula usually selects 7 or 9 body segments, and it is not convenient when subjects are required to keep moving during the experiment or the tests must last for a long time. Also, some previous 3-point formulas were proposed, not considering the season differences so, the results are not accurate in hot summer. This study proposed a new MST calculating formula that just involve 3 body segments and have more accurate performance considering the different seasons impact.
(4) Thermal comfort is indeed affected by some non-thermal parameters. Thermal comfort is a complex cognitive response involving various factors including some non-thermal parameters. Haiying Wang proved that emotional states do have an impact on TSV in light activities and individuals who are ina joyful emotion state, their TSV will improve [60]. Therefore, one no-thermal indicator is applied in this study to evaluate the subjects’ emotional level (EVI). Also, PFI is used as an indicator too. Although PFI is a no-thermal indicator but human physical fitness has an indirect effect on thermal comfort. As you know, motion produces heat. When subjects feel tired, they will stop moving for a break, and heat would reduce.
- The abstract should give quantitative findings.
The author’s answer: We modified the abstract of this article carefully. As you could see, the findings in the abstract are shown with some important data. Indeed, we appreciate the professional reviewer heartily. After we rewrote the abstract according to his/her suggestion, we confirmed that the findings in the abstract part could be read clearly.
- The authors should remove irrelevant references.
The author’s answer: Once, we just deem that references in the article could be numbered disorderly. And it is the disorder that results in some irrelevant references being kept superfluously in this manuscript. Thank you to the careful reviewers who found this mistake and we corrected it this time.
- The result analysis is too simple, lacking in-depth findings.
The author’s answer: The results of this article were just shown briefly. This time we try to add more in-depth analysis in this part. And the modified texts are marked by yellow background color.
- The authors should provide high-resolution figures.
The author’s answer: Dear reviewers, thank you for your kindly reminding. The MS Word compressed some high-resolution figures of this article automatically in order to minimize the file size but without my permission. Now high-definition pictures are supplied to replace the former ones.
- The authors should emphasize meaningful results that can be used in practice. For example, the comfortable temperature range.
The author’s answer: We really agree with the suggestion from the professional reviewer. Therefore, we modified the results and organized the words again in order to make sure the results could be practical.
(1) A reasonable schedule could be proposed based on a healthy and comfortable outdoor thermal experience. TCV and TAV results showed that subjects who stay on a hydrophilic path should limit their leisure time to less than 20 minutes in order to make sure they are comfortable but if subjects must prolong the time, it also could be acceptable within 55 minutes in hot summer. In winter, TAV results show humans who stay in a severely cold environment for entertainment or work should limit to less than 35 minutes. If the time exceeds 35 minutes, the human would feel unacceptable.
(2) A prerequisite could be applied for future similar studies to obtain more accurate thermal environment assessment results. The outdoor thermal environment has a constant impact on humans. Therefore, their valuation of the thermal environment fluctuates during a certain period. Pui Kwan Cheung’s research suggested that most of the respondents (94.6%) accepted the thermal environment at the moment of the interview, whereas only 69.0% of them found it acceptable to stay there for one more hour [67]. Results of this study show that thermal indicators such as TSV, TCV and TAV should be collected only if subjects stay outdoors at least 50 (TSV), 50 (TCV) and 55 (TAV) minutes respectively, in summer and 45 (TSV), 50 (TCV) and 45 (TAV) minutes in winter.
(3) A brief and accurate formula for MST calculating was shown, and it could make the data collection easier. Previous studies proved that different parts of the human body have different sensitivity performances to different thermal environments. Just as this study showed that in a hot environment, the human body such as the back, chest, foot and upper arm are more sensitive. While in a cold environment, the human body such as the chest, forearm and upper arm are more sensitive. Considering the differences in body segments’ sensitivity to hot and cold, this study proposed 2 formulas for MST calculating in summer and winter respectively. And because each new formula involves 3 measuring points, the data could collect easier. On the other hand, fewer measuring points mean fewer devices attaching to the human body. So, subjects’ motion would be freer during the test so that the data would be more accurate.
(4) Some suggestions could be offered as references for park-specific space planning. Results of this study as well as the previous study, show some no-thermal parameters, such as mood and vigor, could also have an influence on subjects’ thermal responses. Therefore, some suggestions about mood and vigor improvement are provided. EVI and PFI results in the leisure path test suggest that recreation space with entertainment facilities for fun should be planned within 30-min-walk intervals and rest space with seats should be planned within 25-min-walk intervals. In addition, it could be thorough in designing the park leisure path considering the thermal indicators meantime. In hot summer, the leisure path needs to provide a shelter for cool within 20-min-walk intervals according to TCV results of the summer hydrophilic path test. In cold winter, a heating room with some function such as hot drink shops could be set for warm within 35-min-walking intervals according to TAV results of the winter boulevard path test. Overall, park planning could also integrate the results of no-thermal indicators and thermal indicators as references in the future.
- It is suggested that the authors should compare this study’s findings with those of existing studies.
The author’s answer: Thank you very much for your strict review. We admit that it would be better if some comparing comments were added. However, this study contains three different kinds of experiments. Also, it is worth noticing that so many indicators are applied in this study such as local skin temperature (Tlocal), mean skin temperature (MST), thermal sensation vote (TSV), thermal comfort vote (TCV), thermal acceptance vote (TAV), emotional valence index (EVI) and physical fitness index (PFI). Therefore, the comparison comments may lead to overlong. However, we are grateful for the reviewers’ valuable proposal, and we plan to compare this study’s findings with those of existing studies in our further essay.
- The conclusions should be concise and give quantitative findings.
The author’s answer: Thank you for your meaningful instruction on our manuscript. And we absolutely agree with you after our careful consideration. Therefore, we modify the description of our findings. Just as you can see that some important “values” obtained from our experiments were added.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
The paper's content is good. Some pictures are not clear, hard to read. An English grammar checker may be needed. Referencing numbers should be in sequence. The citation style should be consistent. Conclusion and recommendation should be separated.
Comments for author File: Comments.pdf
Author Response
Dear editors and reviewers,
Thank you very much for your comments and professional advices. These opinions help to improve academic rigor of our article. Base on your suggestions and requests we have made correct modifications on the revised manuscript. We hope that our work can be improved again. Furthermore, we would like to show the details as follows:
- The paper's content is good. Some pictures are not clear, hard to read. An English grammar checker may be needed. Referencing numbers should be in sequence. The citation style should be consistent. Conclusion and recommendation should be separated.
The author’s answer: Thank you for kindly reminding us about the mistakes in our article. We have modified this article carefully according to your comments. Also, we tried our best to correct the mistakes in English grammar; however, further editing may still be necessary.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
Line 102: Change "the artificial pavilion" to built structures.
124: Change "famous" to "significant".
174-75: Strike Lastly and rephrase "Paper questionnaires were given...".
177: Strike a severely, add "exceptionally."
189: Strike indeed.
230: Strike They were supposed to wear, add "In winter months they wore..."
355: Strike Besides
422-23: Strike acceptable of, change to "...throughout the experiment was acceptable."
465: Add "spend 25 minutes outdoors in order.."
601: Change "prove" to "verify".
755: Change "severely" to "very".
Author Response
Coverletter
Dear Editors,
We are pleased to submit the revised version of our manuscript titled " Constantly tracking and investigating people’s physical, psychological and thermal responses in relation to park strolling in a severe cold region of China—a case study of Stalin Waterfront Park" to your esteemed journal. We appreciate the valuable feedback provided by the reviewers, which has helped us to improve the quality of our work. Besides, all the authors have approved this version of the manuscript and agree with its submission to sustainability.
In response to the reviewers' comments, we have carefully revised the manuscript and addressed all of the issues raised. Specifically, we have made the necessary corrections to the language and expression, ensuring that the citations are closely related to the content.
Furthermore, we have employed MDPI's recommended language editing service to ensure the high quality of our manuscript, and we are confident that this service has improved the clarity and readability of our work.
Additionally, we have thoroughly checked the manuscript for formatting, punctuation, and other minor errors. We believe that these improvements have significantly enhanced the overall quality of our work.
One thing to add is that we would like to bring to your attention that there have been some changes in the authorship of the manuscript. Specifically, several authors have been added, and the order of the authors has been revised. The updated author list is as follows: Tianyu Xi, Huan Qin, Weiqing Xu, Tong Yang, Chenxin Hu, Caiyi Zhao and Haoshun Wang.
We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused and hope that this change will not affect the review process of our manuscript. We would like to clarify that all authors have agreed to the revised authorship and have contributed significantly to the manuscript.
Thank you again for considering our manuscript for publication in your journal, and we look forward to your favorable response. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me at the contact information left below.
Sincerely,
Corresponding author:
Name: Tian-yu XI
E-mail: [email protected]
Tel.:+86-186-8666-6155 (F.L.)
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
The authors have well addressed the issues.
Author Response
Coverletter
Dear Editors,
We are pleased to submit the revised version of our manuscript titled " Constantly tracking and investigating people’s physical, psychological and thermal responses in relation to park strolling in a severe cold region of China—a case study of Stalin Waterfront Park" to your esteemed journal. We appreciate the valuable feedback provided by the reviewers, which has helped us to improve the quality of our work. Besides, all the authors have approved this version of the manuscript and agree with its submission to sustainability.
In response to the reviewers' comments, we have carefully revised the manuscript and addressed all of the issues raised. Specifically, we have made the necessary corrections to the language and expression, ensuring that the citations are closely related to the content.
Furthermore, we have employed MDPI's recommended language editing service to ensure the high quality of our manuscript, and we are confident that this service has improved the clarity and readability of our work.
Additionally, we have thoroughly checked the manuscript for formatting, punctuation, and other minor errors. We believe that these improvements have significantly enhanced the overall quality of our work.
One thing to add is that we would like to bring to your attention that there have been some changes in the authorship of the manuscript. Specifically, several authors have been added, and the order of the authors has been revised. The updated author list is as follows: Tianyu Xi, Huan Qin, Weiqing Xu, Tong Yang, Chenxin Hu, Caiyi Zhao and Haoshun Wang.
We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused and hope that this change will not affect the review process of our manuscript. We would like to clarify that all authors have agreed to the revised authorship and have contributed significantly to the manuscript.
Thank you again for considering our manuscript for publication in your journal, and we look forward to your favorable response. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me at the contact information left below.
Sincerely,
Corresponding author:
Name: Tian-yu XI
E-mail: [email protected]
Tel.:+86-186-8666-6155 (F.L.)
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
