Accessibility Indicators for the Geographical Assessment of Transport Planning in a Latin American Metropolitan Area
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Research related to the improvement of accessibility, territorial cohesion and external effects are used in the evaluation analyzes of road investments (eg Stepniak, Rosik 2013). The submitted work is included in this research stream. This subject is important from the point of view of transport research undertaken within the geography of transport.
Give at least a comparison of the adopted speeds with codex speeds (line 282-297). Describe the limitations of methods (especially in terms of vehicle speed). Give ideas to reduce the limitations of research resulting from the assumption of speed (e.g. see modeling vehicle speed based on: measurements of Intelligent Transport Systems, GPS navigation systems, traffic distribution model, development around roads. For example: Borowska-Stefanska et al. 2019; Sleszyński 2015)
Below, I present detailed comments on the manuscript:
- There are typos in the text, e.g. page 2, line 82, (check the entire manuscript carefully)
- Fig 1; Fig 3; Fig 4; Fig 5; Fig 6 - there is no map scale;
- combine fig 1 and fig 2 (I think that the content of these maps will fit into one figure);
- Table 1 and 2 presents the same data
- correct title of table 2
Stepniak, M., & Rosik, P. (2013). Accessibility improvement, territorial cohesion and spillovers: a multidimensional evaluation of two motorway sections in Poland. Journal of Transport Geography, 31, 154-163.
Borowska-Stefańska, M., Kowalski, M., & Wiśniewski, S. (2019). The Measurement of Mobility-Based Accessibility—The Impact of Floods on Trips of Various Length and Motivation. ISPRS International Journal of Geo-Information, 8(12), 534.
Śleszyński, P. (2015). Expected traffic speed in Poland using Corine land cover, SRTM-3 and detailed population places data. Journal of Maps, 11(2), 245-254.
Author Response
Our responses are in attach file
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
This paper is very interesting by looking at accessibility indicators from network perspective. The case study is of empirical value. The English is well written and readable. The paper is well structured and clearly studied.
I have 2 suggestions for the authors to consider before being accepted for publication.
First, there are some researches on the accessibility from the network perspective which incorporating service quality into consideration. I would like to recommend the authors to look at the following articles.
Shuli Liu, Yulai Wan, Anming Zhang, Does China’s high-speed rail development lead to regional disparities? A network perspective, Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Volume 138, 2020, Pages 299-321,
Shuli Liu, Yulai Wan, Hun-Koo Ha, Yuichiro Yoshida, Anming Zhang,Impact of high-speed rail network development on airport traffic and traffic distribution: Evidence from China and Japan, Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice,Volume 127,2019,Pages 115-135.
Jingjuan Jiao, Fangni Zhang, Jian Liu, A spatiotemporal analysis of the robustness of high-speed rail network in China,Transportation Research Part D: Transport and Environment,Volume 89,2020,102584.
I would say that there exists sufficient studies on the effect of transportation infrastructure or operational services from the perspective of network. However, this manuscript failed to cite those articles.
Second, when the researchers did research from the network perspective, they frequently take time, frequency and even price for certain transportation into consideration, then weighted by population and/or GDP factors.
If the authors can state its novelty on the network perspective and differ it from the previous studies. I would like to say it's suitable for publication. At least, the comparison between traditional accessibility indexes and network indicators also has empirical study values.
Author Response
Our responses are in attach file
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
This study measured the spillover effects of Transport Planning in Latin-America metropolitan Area based on accessibility indicators. These effects were analyzed from the perspective of geographical studies rather than with econometric techniques. Overall, the paper is interesting and novel. However, several problems need to be addressed:
- Section 2.1 should be separated from the section of Materials and Methods since it is more like a literature review.
- Where are the sources of the two different formulations of accessibility in this paper? Are they proposed by the authors? The formulation of locational accessibility seems to be problematic. Because the impedance is usually inversely proportional to the accessibility, while the relationship is opposite in equation(2). How to explain that the larger the travel time, the better the accessibility? The authors are recommended to refer to the following papers:
- Zhang, Y., Li, W., Deng, H., & Li, Y. (2020). Evaluation of public transport-based accessibility to health facilities considering spatial heterogeneity. Journal of Advanced Transportation, 2020.
- Li, W., Li, Y., Ban, X., Deng, H., Shu, H., & Xie, D. (2018). Exploring the relationships between the non-work trip frequency and accessibility based on mobile phone data. Transportation research record, 2672(42), 91-102.
- The changes of dispersion indexes are inverse for the two accessibility indicators employed in this paper. How do the authors explain this?
- The symbols used in this paper are not consistent. For example, Ai is a network efficiency indicator for accessibility in equation(3), while Ai also represents the change or relative improvements in equation(5).
- The numbering of sections 3.3-3.5 is wrong. It should be 2.3-2.5. Besides, Table1 and Table 2 are repetitive.
Author Response
Our responses are in attach file
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 4 Report
Interesting and well-constructed paper. In the reviewed paper, the Authors measured the spillover effects and the territorial cohesion of the Infrastructure Regional Planning to the Latin metropolitan area of Concepción in Chile. In order to meet this purpose, locational and network efficiency indicators of spatial accessibility they calculated using network analysis in GIS. The results showed that the improvements are different according to the accessibility indicator employed; however, they generally showed benefits in consolidates urban centers and corridors nearby investment areas. In my opinion, a paper can be published in a present form. Thank you very much.
Author Response
Our responses are in attach file
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 5 Report
The paper proposes a method to calculate accessibility indicators in order to support transport planning and its Geographical implications. The method is applied in a Latin-America Metropolitan Area.
The paper’s topic is relevant, considering the role of accessibility in transport planning.
Nevertheless, the paper could be improved in order to increase its readability and its collocation in the state-of-the-art relative to transport planning.
In the following, some broad and specific comments are reported.
Comments for author File: Comments.pdf
Author Response
Please see the attachment
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
I am happy to see that the concerns are addressed, and the current manuscript is ready to go into print.
Reviewer 5 Report
The new version improves the paper's quality. The authors consider the great part of my previous suggestions.
