Evaluation of Urban Resilience Based on Trio Spaces: An Empirical Study in Northeast China

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The manuscript focuses on how to build urban resilience and improve urban resilience, and how to establish an urban resilience assessment system through a triple spatial framework of physical space, social space and cyberspace. The CRITIC-entropy weight and cloud evaluation method are used to construct the urban resilience evaluation model. Four sub-provincial cities in Northeast China are selected as the analysis objects, and each city is comprehensively evaluated and spatially evaluated. From the comprehensive evaluation of urban resilience, it is found that the resilience of the four cities is at the ' qualified ' level. From the evaluation of urban resilience subspace, the shortcomings of each city's physical space, social space and cyberspace resilience are discussed by comparison, and some suggestions are put forward from the concept of triple space to help promote the improvement of urban resilience. It has certain research significance, but there are the following questions worth considering.

 1. The author summarizes the advantages and disadvantages of previous studies in the introduction and literature review, and reflects on it, so as to determine that the weighting method uses CRITIC-entropy weight method, but I cannot understand why the author chooses ' three-dimensional space theory ' as the theoretical support framework through the author's description. That is to say, even if the predecessors did not apply the three-dimensional space theory to the evaluation of urban resilience, the author should also explain whether the theory is more applicable than other methods in the field.

 2. In the manuscript, the author gives four characteristics of urban resilience. In previous studies, the characteristics of urban resilience are generally considered to be the organic combination of robustness, recover ability, redundancy, intelligence and adaptability.

 

3. Are the evaluation indicators listed in ' Table 1. Evaluation system of urban resilience... ' comprehensive? In addition, what is the risk the author refers to? Table 1 contains both natural risks and economic risks. When the direction / goal of urban resilience evaluation is not clear ( even if it is all ), I cannot understand whether the evaluation strategy is correct and the evaluation index is perfect. In addition, are policy factors considered as an indicator?

 4. The P6 ' Total length of rail transit operating lines ( km ) ' in the manuscript is suggested to be changed to ' the proportion of traffic trunk lines in the city ' due to the influence of city size.

  5. Taking the weight of I2 and the weight of I3 as an example, the author gives I2 > I3. It is understood that in today's Chinese society, the use of mobile phones is significantly greater than the amount of books borrowed, and people prefer to obtain information from mobile phones. The author's empowerment of the two does not explain this, which makes me question the weight value of ' Table 3. Weights of urban resilience evaluation indicators for the four cities in Northeast China in 2014-2020 ' !

It is suggested that the author elaborates on this.

 6. The author obtained the quantitative value of the resilience of each dimension space, but failed to find out which factor caused it, which had an impact on practical application.

 7. In the weighting method provided by the author, the ' cyberspace ' index is less than the first two ( physical space, social space ), and the index represented by ' cyberspace ' is less important than other indicators. The author concludes in the article: the resilience of cyberspace is insufficient. Is this conclusion affected by empowerment? It is suggested that the author elaborates on this.

 8. It is recommended to compare the results of the cloud model with the simple evaluation results of previous methods to highlight the necessity of using the cloud model.

 9. The evaluation of urban resilience has been involved in the current research, and the evaluation system is becoming more and more perfect. The author must clarify the innovation and difference of the methods and systems in the manuscript.

 All in all, the author must sort out the logic of the article according to the writing norms of scientific papers and check all the details of the article. If the author considers continuing to publish the paper in this journal, he should submit it again after checking.

It is noted that your manuscript needs careful editing by someone with expertise in technical English editing. Please pay particular attention to English grammar, spelling, and sentence structure so that the goals and results of the study are clear to the reader. 

Author Response

Response to Reviewer 1 Comments

Thank you very much for the reviewer's suggestions on this paper. My co-authors and I attach great importance to your suggestions. After careful consideration, searching for information, and careful discussion, we have made every effort to revise your suggestion in this paper. Although some suggestions are difficult for us to modify, we have also provided a response and hope you are satisfied. All page and line numbers in this response are the revision format of WORD.

Point 1: The author summarizes the advantages and disadvantages of previous studies in the introduction and literature review, and reflects on it, so as to determine that the weighting method uses CRITIC-entropy weight method, but I cannot understand why the author chooses ' three-dimensional space theory ' as the theoretical support framework through the author's description. That is to say, even if the predecessors did not apply the three-dimensional space theory to the evaluation of urban resilience, the author should also explain whether the theory is more applicable than other methods in the field.

Response 1: Thank you very much for your suggestion. After the discussion among the authors, this paper added the reason for choosing the trio spaces on page 4, lines 162-168. This paper further explained the trio spaces on page 4, lines 180-193, achieving a supplement to the theoretical Section.

Point 2: In the manuscript, the author gives four characteristics of urban resilience. In previous studies, the characteristics of urban resilience are generally considered to be the organic combination of robustness, recover ability, redundancy, intelligence and adaptability.

Response 2: Thank you very much. Based on your suggestion, we have reviewed relevant papers in online materials such as: https://www.gdass.org/MessageInfo_9359.shtml, http://www.rencity.zju.edu.cn/index.html#/docCollection?id=0 , and the literatures 28 and 50, we have determined the intelligence you mentioned, which is also resourcefulness. Therefore, we have supplemented the "resourcefulness" characteristics and reclassified the indicators based on the characteristics. Specific supplements are provided on page 5, lines 202-220.

Point 3: Are the evaluation indicators listed in ' Table 1. Evaluation system of urban resilience... ' comprehensive? In addition, what is the risk the author refers to? Table 1 contains both natural risks and economic risks. When the direction / goal of urban resilience evaluation is not clear ( even if it is all ), I cannot understand whether the evaluation strategy is correct and the evaluation index is perfect. In addition, are policy factors considered as an indicator?

Response 3: Thank you for your questions. In fact, when discussing resilience evaluation in this paper, we did not consider a single risk. We are conducting a comprehensive resilience evaluation, assuming that cities have resilience capabilities when facing complex risks such as medical risks, economic risks, and natural risks. We explained this on page 4, lines 197 -199. Of course, we also believe that the reviewer's opinion is very correct, and a clear goal may lead to better evaluation results. Therefore, we have added this deficiency in the limitations section (page 17, lines 530-533) to look forward to conducting resilience evaluation with clear goals in the future.

For policy factors, this paper does not separately consider the impact of this indicator on resilience evaluation. There are two main reasons: first, many aspects related to policy factors, such as elderly care, healthcare, economic growth, etc., have been internalized into relevant indicators, and the policy factor effect can be demonstrated through changes in relevant indicators. Second, urban resilience building in China is still in the exploratory stage. Although some cities in China have released local government documents on urban resilience building, local government documents are still mainly based on central government documents. The urban resilience building in different regions can still be seen as guided by the central government, which means that there is not much difference in local policies for the resilience building of each city. We have added these reasons to the paper, as detailed on pages 5-6, lines 226-235.

Point 4: The P6 ' Total length of rail transit operating lines ( km ) ' in the manuscript is suggested to be changed to ' the proportion of traffic trunk lines in the city ' due to the influence of city size.

Response 4: Thank you very much for your suggestion. We have modified the original P6 indicator to the current P8 indicator. With your suggestion, we have adjusted the indicator to "The promotion of urban traffic trunk lines in the national traffic trunk lines" to reduce the impact of urban size on this indicator. After updating the indicators and data, we calculated the weights and normalization of the indicators, and found that they were not affected by changes in the indicators. Therefore, the results of this paper and the weights of the indicators did not change.

Point 5: Taking the weight of I2 and the weight of I3 as an example, the author gives I2 > I3. It is understood that in today's Chinese society, the use of mobile phones is significantly greater than the amount of books borrowed, and people prefer to obtain information from mobile phones. The author's empowerment of the two does not explain this, which makes me question the weight value of ' Table 3. Weights of urban resilience evaluation indicators for the four cities in Northeast China in 2014-2020 ' ! It is suggested that the author elaborates on this.

Response 5: Thank you very much for your question about the weight. The I2 mentioned is "Public library collection per 100 people (books)", and I3 is the "Number of cell phones per 10,000 people (units)". Both of these data refer to the amount of data resources available, rather than indicators specific to reading volume. I2 can be seen as how many books can provide data, while I3 can be seen as the extent to which electronic resources are obtained. These indicators reflect more the availability of data than the amount of reading. In addition, the weights of 2014, 2015, 2019, and 2020 are indeed I2>I3. But in fact, I3>I2 were shown in 2016-2018, all of which come from internal characteristics of the data. This is highly likely due to the increased availability of books in urban libraries from 2014 to 2015 and from 2019 to 2020, while the number of mobile phone owners has not significantly increased. I hope our explanation can satisfy you. However, we may further investigate the opinion you mentioned in the future, such as exploring why there is a significant difference in weight between these two indicators in different years from the data.

Point 6: The author obtained the quantitative value of the resilience of each dimension space, but failed to find out which factor caused it, which had an impact on practical application.

Response 6: Thank you very much. In fact, in this paper, we are more concerned about the impact of different sub-space resilience on comprehensive resilience, rather than focusing on why there are differences in the levels of sub-space resilience. However, the question you mentioned is worth considering. Since this paper does not focus on this issue, we have added this deficiency in the limitations section, which is detailed on page 17, lines 527-530.

Point 7: In the weighting method provided by the author, the ' cyberspace ' index is less than the first two ( physical space, social space ), and the index represented by ' cyberspace ' is less important than other indicators. The author concludes in the article: the resilience of cyberspace is insufficient. Is this conclusion affected by empowerment? It is suggested that the author elaborates on this.

Response 7: Thank you very much. In fact, the lack of resilience in cyber space is not due to its unimportance. To solve the question, we have searched for the relevant literature and found the reasons. "Although the development of big data in the world has reached a climax since 2013, and the Chinese government is also laying out the development strategy of big data. It was only after 2016 that the Chinese government began to gradually and comprehensively promote the development and application of big data [66]. Since the application and promotion of big data in various regions need time and cycle, and there is regional imbalance in technology development. It means that the enhancement of cyber space resilience in various regions needs a process. It is the reason for the lower cyber space resilience compared to physical space resilience and societal space resilience in evaluating the urban resilience of these 4 Northeastern cities in China from 2014 to 2020. "We have also added this reason to the discussion and conclusion section, which can be found on page 16, lines 459-468.

Point 8: It is recommended to compare the results of the cloud model with the simple evaluation results of previous methods to highlight the necessity of using the cloud model.

Response 8: Thank you for your suggestion. Based on your suggestion, we have also conducted an evaluation using the fuzzy comprehensive evaluation method and attached the evaluation results in the Appendix A (page 19). We will provide a specific comparison in the results section, as shown on page 12, lines 360-373.

Point 9: The evaluation of urban resilience has been involved in the current research, and the evaluation system is becoming more and more perfect. The author must clarify the innovation and difference of the methods and systems in the manuscript.

Response 9: Thank you very much. We have supplemented the innovation in this paper. It can be found on page 17, lines 504-513.

Point 10: All in all, the author must sort out the logic of the article according to the writing norms of scientific papers and check all the details of the article. If the author considers continuing to publish the paper in this journal, he should submit it again after checking.

Response 10: We have completed all the details of the paper as much as possible within our capabilities, including grammar check, word selection check, content check, etc., in accordance with your requirements. We hope that our modifications can satisfy you. Thank you.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

The article presents an interesting and comprehensive approach for the assessment of urban resilience, validated by the respective application with real datasets in the case study. The text is an original effort of the authors.

The strengths of this work is the methodology, which is sound, novel and supported by an adequate number of very relevant references, along with the case study, which is interesting and well presented. However, there are some serious weaknesses related with the use of the English language in the technical writing and the presentation of the arguments. Unfortunately, at some parts of the text and mainly in the abstract, the introduction, the problem statement, the results and the conclusions, there are problems in the vocabulary and the syntax that is difficult for the reader to understand. It was also observed that some sections’ titles should be revised. Please find details about this issue in the following comments' section. The authors are kindly asked to consider revising or rewriting some of these parts to promote this interesting work.

The term ‘Trio Spaces’ is crucial to this work and yet it is not adequately presented. There are no references to the authors, who originally introduced this term, e.g. Fang et al. (2017). It is not clear to the reader how the trio spaces approach is different from a three-dimensional approach, for example. It is recommended to revise the introduction of this term and the relevant conceptual and methodological approach with the appropriate references.

The authors should describe of the structure of the article at the end of the Introduction. It is recommended to add a short paragraph describing the content of the following sections of the paper.

Figure 1 is not very explanatory for the relationship described in the text. The authors are recommended to revise it to demonstrate the described complexity.

The authors are advised when a specific term is presented e.g. ‘cloud evaluation model’, or ‘CRITIC-entropy’ to add the respective citation next to it. Similarly, in the section 3.2, where the indicators are selected, the authors should underline in the text that these indicators derived from the literature.

In the section 3.3.1 and in the lines 192 – 195, the authors explain the CRITIC-entropy method and they refer to the information entropy. However, according to the presented equations, this method does not include the information entropy, but a statistical equivalent form of entropy. Please, clarify this reference to the information entropy.

In the 3.3.2 second paragraph that explains the ‘cloud evaluation model’, please provide some indicative references. The authors are recommended to elaborate a little bit more on the related principles of information theory.

In section 4.2, line 277 the authors claim that the average cloud drops are around (0.500, 0.039, 0.005). However, with a quick look at Table 4, the average En is 0.32 and the average He is clearly 0.001 (as set by the authors). Please, revise this statement.

The authors are kindly required to clarify the elements presented in Figures 5 and 6, perhaps identify them with the different colors, line types etc.

In the Conclusions in the line 398, the authors refer to ‘the concept of trio space’. This is confusing to the reader, since the introduced term was ‘trio spaces’. The authors should consider revising it.

Concerning the References of this paper, they are adequate in number and relevant in their content, especially the ones that refer to the methodology. The references related to the state of the art resilience are significantly older and the reference about urbanization (references no. 2 and 3) are somehow obsolete. Special attention is required in:

o  References 16, 17, which refer to community resilience policies and not to urban systems’ resilience as implied in the text.

o   Reference 18, which not the most representative reference about the origins of the resilience concept. This reference should be replaced.

o   Reference 38, which is about educational resilience is irrelevant and must be replaced.

o   References 53 and 59 do not correspond to any citation in the text. The reference list to be updated.

Text Identifier	Comments
Page 1: Abstract: line 13	The use of the phrase “urban construction” is confusing. Either refers to a specific construction or should be replaced by the phrase “urban development”
Page 1: Abstract: line 14	Please check grammar “the framework … includes”
Page 1: Abstract: line 19-20	Please rephrase to clarify evaluation’s ranking and the duration of the observations
Page 1: Abstract: line 14	Please clarify: “implications are proposed to help”
Page 1: line 45	Please revise and preferably replace the adjective ‘strong’ in this context.
Page 2: line 47	Check English syntax.
Page 2: line 50	Please consider rephrasing the “strength of this ability”
Page 2: line 54	Please consider rephrasing the “resilience is different in strength and weakness”
Page 2: lines 56-58	Please clarify “Urban resilience … changes over time.”
Page 2: line 61	Please revise the phrase ‘urban construction’
Page 2: lines 63-65	Please consider rephrasing by replacing the questions with plain descriptions.
Page 2: line 77	Please consider replacing the verb “proposed” to revise the sentence.
Page 2: Literature Review: Paragraph 2	Resistance and self-recovery are abilities. Please consider omitting the word ‘ability’ or rephrasing if you are describing something different.
Page 2: lines 86, 87	Please consider revising the phrases ‘stronger resilience’, ‘strength of resilience’ etc.
Page 2: lines 86-87	Please revise the sentence containing the ‘efficiency of self-recovery’. Efficiency characterizes systems and self-recovery is a system’s ability.
Page 2: lines 87-88	Please revise the sentence. The verb is missing or ‘to’ is redundant
Page 2: line 89	Please revise the sentence containing the ‘efficiency of recovery’ as in the previous comment
Page 2: lines 94-96	Please consider revising this sentence to clarify its meaning by employing more technical language
Page 3: line 100	Please explain the term ‘propose resilience optimization strategies’ or revise the sentence
Page 3: line 102	Please check the grammar: “focuses”
Page 3: Paragraph 1 and 2 lines 102-3	The phrases ‘evaluation system’ and ‘evaluation methods’ refer to evaluation or assessment approaches and methodologies? Please clarify with the correct technical terms, since the term ‘system’ is already used for the ‘urban system’ and it is confusing
Page 3: lines 103-4	Please check syntax and revise ‘due to the city is a complex giant system’
Page 3: lines 109-110	Please revise to clarify the sentence ‘The key to urban resilience is to resist various risks’
Page 3: line 114	Please check the grammar and syntax and revise the phrase ‘questioned due to being too subjective’
Page 3: line 116	Please explain the ‘traditional fuzzy comprehensive 116 evaluation method’
Page 3: line 118	Please check grammar
Page 3: line 118	Please explain the ‘DEA’ acronym
Page 3: Evaluation of Urban Resilience: Par. 2	The cloud evaluation model is a computer-aided simulation method? Please explain a little bit more. Could you provide an example of the ‘randomness and fuzziness in the evaluation process’?
Page 3: line 128	Please consider revising the word ‘connotation’
Page 3: Evaluation of Urban Resilience: Par. 3	The entire paragraph should be revised and rewritten using a more technical language about the proposed methodological approaches. It is not easy for the reader to understand the content.
Page 3: lines 114, 5	Please revise the sentence, the subject is missing. Urban what?
Page 3: line 143	Please consider referring to the authors who originally introduced the “trio spaces” concept i.e.; Fang et al. 2017. More citations from different sources are required here.
Page 4: line 151	Please rephrase or clarify.
Page 4: line 171	Please consider revising the title
Page 6: line 185	Please consider replacing the word ‘volatility’
Page 6: line 192	Please rephrase or clarify the sentence ‘The entropy method is based on the characteristics of entropy.’ Which entropy, please explain
Page 8: line 248	Please provide numbers in arithmetic form in parentheses, e.g. “four (4) cities”
Page 8: line 251	Please consider revising the phrase ‘urban construction’
Page 8: lines 250-4	Please revise the sentence because it is not clear
Page 10: lines 294-6	Please consider revising the terms like the ‘physical spatial resilience’. A suggestion could be ‘physical space resilience’.
Page 13: lines 364-6	Please consider revising to clarify. ‘Resilience construction’ should be replaced with ‘resilience enhancement’ or ‘resilience building’ etc.
Page 14: line 364	Please reconsider the use of the word ‘risk’ in this context

Author Response

Thank you very much for the your suggestions. My co-authors and I discussed your suggestions very carefully. After consideration, searching for information, and discussion, we have made every effort to revise your suggestion in this paper. Although some suggestions are difficult for us to modify, we have also provided a response and hope you are satisfied. All page and line numbers in this response are the revision format of WORD.

 Point 1: The term ‘Trio Spaces’ is crucial to this work and yet it is not adequately presented. There are no references to the authors, who originally introduced this term, e.g. Fang et al. (2017). It is not clear to the reader how the trio spaces approach is different from a three-dimensional approach, for example. It is recommended to revise the introduction of this term and the relevant conceptual and methodological approach with the appropriate references.

Response 1: Thank you very much for your suggestion. We have specifically added reference Fang et al. (2017) (reference 44) in this version, and also provided in-depth explanations on trio spaces (page 4, lines 161-193). In Fang et al. (2017) reference, this research framework is also referred to as trio spaces, so in order to avoid confusion for readers, we did not discuss the differences between three dimensional approach and trio spaces (as three dimensional approach is not covered in this article).

Point 2: The authors should describe of the structure of the article at the end of the Introduction. It is recommended to add a short paragraph describing the content of the following sections of the paper.

Response 2: Thank you very much. We have added an article structure at the end of the Introduction Section, which is detailed on page 2, lines 79-83.

Point 3: Figure 1 is not very explanatory for the relationship described in the text. The authors are recommended to revise it to demonstrate the described complexity.

Response 3: Thank you very much. We have revised the Figure 1 (page 5, lines 204-220)

Point 4: The authors are advised when a specific term is presented e.g. ‘cloud evaluation model’, or ‘CRITIC-entropy’ to add the respective citation next to it. Similarly, in the section 3.2, where the indicators are selected, the authors should underline in the text that these indicators derived from the literature.

Response 4: Thank you very much. We have added some references, such as reference 50 in 3.2; 58, 60 for the method.

Point 5: In the section 3.3.1 and in the lines 192 – 195, the authors explain the CRITIC-entropy method and they refer to the information entropy. However, according to the presented equations, this method does not include the information entropy, but a statistical equivalent form of entropy. Please, clarify this reference to the information entropy.

Response 5: Thank you very much. We dicussed your suggestion, and deleted the sentence about information entropy (page 7, line 252).

Point 6: In the 3.3.2 second paragraph that explains the ‘cloud evaluation model’, please provide some indicative references. The authors are recommended to elaborate a little bit more on the related principles of information theory. 

Response 6: Thank you very much. We added more about cloud evaluation model (page 8, lines 284-294; 299-305). On the principle of Information theory, we have inquired about relevant literature, and there is no suitable content to supplement. This article does not supplement contents about information theory. However, we think this is a very interesting topic, and we can study it in the future.

Point 7: In section 4.2, line 277 the authors claim that the average cloud drops are around (0.500, 0.039, 0.005). However, with a quick look at Table 4, the average En is 0.32 and the average He is clearly 0.001 (as set by the authors). Please, revise this statement.

Response 7: Thank you very much. We have revised the statement. It can be found on page 12, lines 350-354; lines 374-378)

Point 8: The authors are kindly required to clarify the elements presented in Figures 5 and 6, perhaps identify them with the different colors, line types etc.

Response 8: Thank you very much. In the Figure 5 and Figure 6, we have added line annotations to distinguish between cyber space resilience and comprehensive resilience. (page 14, line 404; page 15, line 420)

Point 9: In the Conclusions in the line 398, the authors refer to ‘the concept of trio space’. This is confusing to the reader, since the introduced term was ‘trio spaces’. The authors should consider revising it.

Response 9: Thank you very much. We have deleted “the concept of” (page 16, line 439)

Point 10: Concerning the References of this paper, they are adequate in number and relevant in their content, especially the ones that refer to the methodology. The references related to the state of the art resilience are significantly older and the reference about urbanization (references no. 2 and 3) are somehow obsolete. Special attention is required in:

(1) References 16, 17, which refer to community resilience policies and not to urban systems’ resilience as implied in the text.

(2) Reference 18, which not the most representative reference about the origins of the resilience concept. This reference should be replaced.

(3) Reference 38, which is about educational resilience is irrelevant and must be replaced.

(4) References 53 and 59 do not correspond to any citation in the text. The reference list to be updated.

Response 10: Thank you very much. We deleted the reference 3 and added the reference 2 .

2. Crankshaw, O.; Borel-Saladin, J. Causes of urbanisation and counter-urbanisation in Zambia: Natural population increase or migration? Urban Stud. 2018, 56(10), 2005-2020. (page 19, lines 555-557)

(1) The original references 16 and 17 are changed. Due to an increase in literature, they are now references 16 and 18.

16. Wang, Z. R.; Fu, H. Q.; Zhou, L. Multiple urban resilience evaluation of resource-based cities' sustainable transformation effect. Resour. Conserv. Recy. 2023, 191, 106912. (page 19, lines 582-583)
17. Feng, X.; Xiu, C.; Bai, L.; Zhong, Y.; Wei, Y. Comprehensive evaluation of urban resilience based on the perspective of land-scape pattern: A case study of Shenyang city. Cities 2020, 104, 102722. (page 19, lines 586-587)

(2) The original reference 18 has been replaced by the reference 19.

19. Li, D. Q.; Selig, E. T. Resilient modulus for fine-Grained subgrade soils. Mech. MaterASCE-Amer. Soc. Civil Engineers. 1994, 120(6), 939-957. (page 20, lines 591-593)

(3) The original reference 38 has been replaced by the reference 39.

39. Brown, C.; Shaker, R. R.; Das, R. A review of approaches for monitoring and evaluation of urban climate resilience initiatives. Environ. Dev. Sustain. 2016, 20(1), 23–40. (page 20, lines 633-634)

(4) The original reference 53 and 59 have cited in the paper, which is now the reference 59 and 65. The reference 59 is cited on page 7, line 256. The reference 65 is cited on page 9, line 313.

Point 11: Comments on the Quality of English Language

(1) The use of the phrase “urban construction” is confusing. Either refers to a specific construction or should be replaced by the phrase “urban development” (Page 1: Abstract: line 13)

Response (1): Thank you very much. We have modified it into “urban development” (Page 1: Abstract: line 13)

(2) Please check grammar “the framework … includes” (Page 1: Abstract: line 14)

Response (2): Thank you very much. We have modified the grammar. (Page 1: Abstract: line 14)

(3) Please rephrase to clarify evaluation’s ranking and the duration of the observations (Page 1: Abstract: line 19-20)

Response (3): Thank you very much. We have modified it. (Page 1: Abstract: line 20-22)

(4) Please clarify: “implications are proposed to help” (Page 1: Abstract: line 14)

Response (4): Thank you very much. We have clarified it. (Page 1: Abstract: line 25-28)

(5) Please revise and preferably replace the adjective ‘strong’ in this context. (Page 1: line 45)

Response (5): Thank you very much. We have modified it (Page 2, line 49)

(6) Check English syntax. (Page 2 line 47)

Response (6): Thank you very much. We have modified English syntax. (Page 2 line 49)

(7) Please consider rephrasing the “strength of this ability” (Page 2 line 48)

Response (7): Thank you very much. We have modified it. (Page 2 line 54)

(8) Please consider rephrasing the “resilience is different in strength and weakness” (Page 2 line 54)

Response (8): Thank you very much. We have deleted and modified this sentence. (Page 2 line 58)

(9) Please clarify “Urban resilience … changes over time.” (Page 2 line 56-58)

Response (9): Thank you very much. We have modified the sentence. (Page 2 line 60-62)

(10) Please revise the phrase ‘urban construction’ (Page 2 line 61)

Response (10): Thank you very much. We have deleted it. (Page 2 line 66)

(11) Please consider rephrasing by replacing the questions with plain descriptions. (Page 2: lines 63-65)

Response (11): Thank you very much. We reprased the questions (Page 2: lines 67-70)

(12)Please consider replacing the verb “proposed” to revise the sentence. (Page 2: line 77)

Response (12): Thank you very much. We have revised into “developed”. (Page 2:line 89)

(13)Resistance and self-recovery are abilities. Please consider omitting the word ‘ability’ or rephrasing if you are describing something different. (Page 2: Literature Review: Paragraph 2)

Response (13): Thank you very much. We have deleted the ability in this paper. (Page 2: lines 93-94; 112)

(14)Please consider revising the phrases ‘stronger resilience’, ‘strength of resilience’ etc. (Page 2: lines 86, 87)

Response (14): Thank you very much. We have modified it. (Page 3: lines 98-100)

(15) Please revise the sentence containing the ‘efficiency of self-recovery’. Efficiency characterizes systems and self-recovery is a system’s ability. (Page 2: lines 86-87)

Response (15): Thank you very much. We have modified them (Page 3, line 100-102)

(16) Please revise the sentence. The verb is missing or ‘to’ is redundant (Page 2 lines 87-88)

Response (16): Thank you very much. We have deleted “to”. (Page 3 line 100)

(17)Please revise the sentence containing the ‘efficiency of recovery’ as in the previous comment (Page 2 line 89)

Response (17): Thank you very much. We have modified it. (Page 3 line 102)

(18)Please consider revising this sentence to clarify its meaning by employing more technical language (Page 2 lines 94-96)

Response (18): Thank you very much. We have modified this sentence. (Page 3 lines 107-111)

(19)Please explain the term ‘propose resilience optimization strategies’ or revise the sentence (Page 3 line 100)

Response (19): Thank you very much. We have modified the sentence. (Page 3 line 114)

(20) Please check the grammar: “focuses”(Page 3 line 102)

Response (20): Thank you very much. We have modified it. (Page 3 line 117)

(21) The phrases ‘evaluation system’ and ‘evaluation methods’ refer to evaluation or assessment approaches and methodologies? Please clarify with the correct technical terms, since the term ‘system’ is already used for the ‘urban system’ and it is confusing (Paragraph 1 and 2 lines 102-3)

Response (21): Thank you very much. We have modified it into “evaluation index system”. And all the“evaluation system” in this paper changed into “evaluation index system”. (Page 3:line 120)

(22) Please check syntax and revise ‘due to the city is a complex giant system’ (Page 3: lines 103-4)

Response (22): Thank you very much. We have modified this sentence. (Page 3: line 119)

(23) Please revise to clarify the sentence ‘The key to urban resilience is to resist various risks’ (Page 3: lines 109-110)

Response (23): Thank you very much. We have deleted it. (Page 1: line 125)

(24)Please check the grammar and syntax and revise the phrase ‘questioned due to being too subjective’ (Page 3: line 114)

Response (24): Thank you very much. We have checked and revised it. (Page 3: lines 130-131)

(25) Please explain the ‘traditional fuzzy comprehensive 116 evaluation method’ (Page 3: line 116)

Response (25): Thank you very much. We have modified it (Page 3, line 133)

(26)Please check grammar. (Page 3: line 118)

Response (26): Thank you very much. We have modified English grammar. (Page 3 line 135)

(27)Please explain the ‘DEA’ acronym (Page 3: line 118)

Response (27): Thank you very much. We have explained it. (Page 3 line 135)

(28)The cloud evaluation model is a computer-aided simulation method? Please explain a little bit more. Could you provide an example of the ‘randomness and fuzziness in the evaluation process’? (Evaluation of Urban Resilience: Par. 2)

Response (28): Thank you very much. We have modified this paragragh. (Page 3 lines 135-145)

(29) Please consider revising the word ‘connotation’(Page 3: line 128)

Response (29): Thank you very much. We have modified it into “concept”. (Page 3 line 146)

(30)The entire paragraph should be revised and rewritten using a more technical language about the proposed methodological approaches. It is not easy for the reader to understand the content. (Page 3: Evaluation of Urban Resilience: Par. 3)

Response (30): Thank you very much. We have changed some description in this paragragh. But this paragragh is the conclusion of all the literatures. We use the form of segmentation to make it more obvious (Pages 3-4 lines 147-159)

(31)Please revise the sentence, the subject is missing. Urban what? (Page 3: lines 114, 5)

Response (31): Sorry, we did not find this sentence.

(32)Please consider referring to the authors who originally introduced the “trio spaces” concept i.e.; Fang et al. 2017. More citations from different sources are required here.( Page 3: line 143)

Response (32): Thank you very much. We have added the reference. (Page 4: line 169)

(33) Please rephrase or clarify. (Page 4: line 151)

Response (33): Thank you very much. We have modified it. (Page 4 lines 178-180; lines 187-193)

(34)Please consider revising the title (Page 4: line 171)

Response (34): Thank you very much. We have revised the title. (Page 5: line 223)

(35)Please consider replacing the word ‘volatility’ (Page 6: line 185)

Response (35): Thank you very much. We have modified it (Page 7, line 246)

(36) Please rephrase or clarify the sentence ‘The entropy method is based on the characteristics of entropy.’ Which entropy, please explain (Page 6: line 192)

Response (36): Thank you very much. We have deleted this sentence(Page 7 line 253)

(37)Please provide numbers in arithmetic form in parentheses, e.g. “four (4) cities”(Page 8: line 248)

Response (37): Thank you very much. We have modified all the four into 4 in this paper. (Page 10 line 321)

(38)Please consider revising the phrase ‘urban construction’ (Page 8: line 251)

Response (38): Thank you very much. We have modified it. (Page 10 line 327)

(39)Please revise the sentence because it is not clear (Page 8: lines 250-4)

Response (39): Thank you very much. We have modified these sentences. (Page 10 line 323-327)

(40)Please consider revising the terms like the ‘physical spatial resilience’. A suggestion could be ‘physical space resilience’. (Page 10: lines 294-6)

Response (40): Thank you very much. We have modified the “spatial” into “space” in the whole paper. (Page 12 line 384-387)

(41)Please consider revising to clarify. ‘Resilience construction’ should be replaced with ‘resilience enhancement’ or ‘resilience building’ etc. (Page 13: lines 364-6)

Response (41): Thank you very much. We have changed all the “resilience construction” into “resilience building” (Page 16: lines 470-473)

(42)  Please reconsider the use of the word ‘risk’ in this context (Page 14: line 364)

Response (42): Thank you very much. We have revised it. (Page 17:line 498)

 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Generally:

The topic of the article is probably the most frequent current research in the field of sustainability and urban theory. The relevance of the research is indisputable, the research in generall is branched into several lines. Within the methodology used, the presented result is acceptable. The essence is included in the sentence at the end: Lines 408,409... a single evaluation method is used in this paper. In the future, multiple evaluation methods can be compared to consolidate the evaluation results.

The problem of resilience can also be looked at culturally. Civilizations collapsed due to decay culture. Defining the cultural anti-fragility of the city is at the limit of the possibility of quantitative research. We should turn to philosophy. Let's leave aside the question of whether and how the city's resilience is shaped by theater and concert culture and civic activities, or even the presence of universities.

The presented article is essentially an advanced case study using the CRITIC-entropy value method and cloud evaluation method. The question remains, to what extent are the results of this study generalizable for the use of the mentioned method for other, different cities?

A few small notes:

Line 14... the adjectives economy and cultural are included in societal?

Line 39... in this situation, what are we to think of contemporary ghost cities? https://allthatsinteresting.com/chinese-ghost-cities

Line 40... the concept of Resilience is close to the concept of Antifragile as described by Nassim Nicholas Taleb in his book of the same name

Line 63... will the issues be solved in this paper, or just analyzed and discussed?

Line 148... "cultural, educational" could be the crucial factors

Line 152... cyber space refers to the term Smart City

Line 170... Figure 1. ...excellent!

 

Conclusion: If we consider the article as a case study for the application of a specific method to the analyzed cities, it is publishable in the form presented.

 

Author Response

Thank you very much for your suggestions on this paper. My co-authors and I have made every effort to revise your suggestion in this paper. We have provided this response and hope you are satisfied. All page and line numbers in this response are the revision format of WORD.

Point 1:The presented article is essentially an advanced case study using the CRITIC-entropy value method and cloud evaluation method. The question remains, to what extent are the results of this study generalizable for the use of the mentioned method for other, different cities?

Response 1: Thank you for your suggestion. We believe this method could fit for the different cities.

Point 2: Line 14... the adjectives economy and cultural are included in societal?

Response 2: Yes, the societal space include economy and cultural activities. Indeed, in this paper, societal space includes various activities of human survival and life that cannot be seen or touched. The social system, economic system, and organizational system in the urban system belong to societal space. This illustration we added in the revised version on page 4 lines183-185.

Point 3: Line 39... in this situation, what are we to think of contemporary ghost cities? https://allthatsinteresting.com/chinese-ghost-cities

Response 3: Thank you very much for your question. In this article, we did not consider the connection between ghost cities and urban resilience. Therefore, it is a little hard to answer this question. But we think this is a good topic that we can further explore through learning on this website in the future.

Point 4: Line 40... the concept of Resilience is close to the concept of Antifragile as described by Nassim Nicholas Taleb in his book of the same name

Response 4: Thank you very much. We will read this book for deepening the concept of urban resilience.

Point 5: Line 63... will the issues be solved in this paper, or just analyzed and discussed?

Response 5: Thank you very much. We analyzed and discussed these two issues in this paper.

Point 6: Line 148... "cultural, educational" could be the crucial factors

Response 6: Thank you very much. We will focus on these crucial factors.

Point 7: Line 152... cyber space refers to the term Smart City

Response 7: Thank you very much. But the cyber space is different from the Smart City. Cyber space includes various resources such as data, information technology, and networks. The cyber space is also invisible and intangible, but it is not a human activity, and is a variety of data and technological resources. In fact, after entering the 21st century, the impact of technology has become crucial for the urban development, and the importance of intelligence is also being emphasized in urban resilience. Therefore, evaluating the resilience of urban cyber space helps to evaluate the comprehensive resilience of cities from the perspectives of information, intelligence, and data. (page 4, lines 179-181; lines 187-193) We illustrated the cyber space in the paper. We hope readers can better understand cyber space.

Point 8: Line 170... Figure 1. ...excellent!

Response 8: Thank you very much. And we have revised this Figure 1 more better (page 5, line 221)

 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

The paper analyses in a complex way, including a moderately extensive literature review, the concept of "resilience". As the first references, included in the introduction, show, the concept of resilience first refered to disaster resilience. In this context some more references are needed (ex. Bruneau, Chang). As the definition is given, resilience in this paper is more general, connected to entropy, as in French urban planning studies. Also in this field more references are needed.

The description of the method is fine, but somehow too authoritative. This should not be (starting with the abstract) be the method, but just one method. A graphic visualising the tree would be useful.

The case studies are well considered and 4 case studies are really extensive.

The discussion is of an appropriate depth.

Author Response

Thank you very much for your suggestions on this paper. My co-authors and I have made every effort to revise your suggestion in this paper. We have provided this response and hope you are satisfied. All page and line numbers in this response are the revision format of WORD.

Point 1: The paper analyses in a complex way, including a moderately extensive literature review, the concept of "resilience". As the first references, included in the introduction, show, the concept of resilience first refered to disaster resilience. In this context some more references are needed (ex. Bruneau, Chang). As the definition is given, resilience in this paper is more general, connected to entropy, as in French urban planning studies. Also in this field more references are needed.

Response 1: We further supplemented the introduction, literature review, and theoretical section of the paper, and added more literatures to support the viewpoint of this paper. It can be found on pages 2-6.

Point 2: The description of the method is fine, but somehow too authoritative. This should not be (starting with the abstract) be the method, but just one method. A graphic visualising the tree would be useful.

Response 2: To solve this problem, we try our best to illustrate the context constructure of this paper on page 2, lines 79-83. And then, the Figure 1 could illustrate the theory of trio spaces (page 5, lines 219)

Point 3: The case studies are well considered and 4 case studies are really extensive. The discussion is of an appropriate depth.

Response 3: Thank you very much. We have made more additions to the results section and discusstion and conclusion sections, hoping to have a deeper understanding. It can be found on page 12, lines 353-373, page 16, lines 459-468, and page 17, lines 504-512, 527-533.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

All the reviewer's comments have been revised. 

English editting grammar errors have been corrected. The quality of the manuscript has been improved.

Author Response

Thank you very much!

Reviewer 2 Report

The reviewer congratulates the authors for their direct and very effective responses to all the comments, a fact that demonstrates their zeal and commitment to their work. After reviewing the revised version of the paper the following comments are provided:

ID	Text Identifier	Comments
1	Page 1: line 12	The authors are advised to revise the opening sentence of the abstract. It is recommended to omit the word “how” and use the respective action-related nouns
2	Page 1: line 16	Please use correctly the numbers in the text i.e. ‘Four (4) sub provincial cities’
3	Page 1: line 22	Please use correctly the numbers in the entire text i.e. ‘these four (4) cities’
4	Page 1: line 22	The revised version of the text is not clear to the reviewer
5	Page 1: lines 25-28	The word ‘implication’ has a negative connotation and cannot be ‘proposed to help promote’. Please consider revising the sentence or replacing this word.
6	Page 2: line 52	Please check the syntax of the sentence, i.e: ‘to maintain […] or to recover’
7	Page 2: lines 58-59	The reviewer cannot understand the revised text. The authors imply that the resilience of each city is characterized by different levels, which may be influenced […]. Please revise if necessary.
8	Page 2: line 75	Please use the numbers correctly with parentheses, i.e. ‘Taking four (4) sub-provincial…’
9	Page 3: line 125	Please elaborate a little bit more on the sentence: ‘The key to urban resilience is to resist various risks.’ The term risk describes the exposure to danger. One cannot resist to the probability of being exposed, but can either reduce this probability or mitigate the impacts. To the reviewer’s understanding, the key is the effective response and not the resistance to risks.
11	Page 4: line 156	Please use the numbers in parentheses, i.e. ‘study is conducted on four (4) cities in Northeast China’
12	Page 4: line 165	Please use the numbers correctly, i.e. ‘from five (5) sub-systems’
13	Page 4: lines 181-182	Please consider the use of the word connections. The reviewer understands that the authors mean ‘similarities’
15	Page 7: line 253	Please consider elaborating a little bit more or omitting the seemingly redundant sentence: ‘The entropy method is based on the characteristics of entropy’.
16	Page 8: line 287	Please consider the phrase ‘evaluating object’. To the reviewer’s understanding the authors refer to the evaluated object/value or the object to be evaluated
17	Page 8: line 288	Please consider the phrase ‘evaluating things’. To the reviewer’s understanding the authors refer to the observations to be evaluated
18	Page 8: line 295	The authors are advised to revise the phrase: ‘appropriate value’, because it is vague. The reviewer suspects that what the authors meant here is a synonym to standard value
	Page 11: lines 341-345	Please use the numbers correctly
19	Page 12: lines 349-350	Since the authors have conditionally set the super-entropy value to 0.001, which is also correctly presented in Table 4, please revise the statement: ‘the Ex highest point of resilience of cloud drops in each city is concentrated near (0.500, 0.039, 0.005)’. How is the super-entropy value of 0.005 derived?
20	Page 12	Please use the numbers correctly
21	Page 16: lines 447, 468	Please use the numbers correctly, i.e. four (4)
22	Page 16: line 471	Please consider revising the phrase: ‘should be paid attention to’ at the end of the sentence. It is recommended to use verbs like underline, highlight, etc
23	Page 16: line 519	Please use the numbers correctly, i.e. four (4)

The reviewer recognizes that the improvement of the language is great and really enhances the overall quality of this work. Some few minor comments about the language are provided hereby:

ID	Text Identifier	Comments
1	Page 4: line 151	Please check the grammatical form of the verb combine.
2	Page 4: line 182	Please consider the use of the phrase ‘in essence’. It is recommended to revise it.

Author Response

Thank you for the your suggestions. According to your suggestions, we revised the paper very carefully. We provided the response and hope you are satisfied about our revision. All page and line numbers in this response are the revision format of WORD.

Point 1: The authors are advised to revise the opening sentence of the abstract. It is recommended to omit the word “how” and use the respective action-related nouns. (Page 1: line 12)

Response 1: Thank you very much. We have revised this sentence into “Realizing the building of urban resilience and improving the urban resilience has become important contents of the urban development.”, and omitted the word “how”. (Page 1: lines 12-13)

Point 2: Please use correctly the numbers in the text i.e. ‘Four (4) sub provincial cities’ (Page 1: line 16)

Response 2: Thank you very much. We hope that we understand and make the correct modifications in the revision, that is, the form in the paper is “Four(4)/four (4)”. We have made modifications to all 21 parts of the paper, which also include the parts that need to be modified as mentioned in comments 3, 8, 10, 17, 19, 20 and 22. (Page 1: line 16)

Point 3: Please use correctly the numbers in the entire text i.e. ‘these four (4) cities’ (Page 1: line 22)

Response 3: Thank you very much. We have revised the numbers (Page 1, line 22)

Point 4: The revised version of the text is not clear to the reviewer (Page 1: line 22)

Response 4: Thank you very much. We have modified the sentence again. Now the sentence is “Although there are differences in resilience evaluation values of four (4) cities, the resilience levels of these cities are all "qualified"” (Page 1: lines 21-23)

Point 5: The word ‘implication’ has a negative connotation and cannot be ‘proposed to help promote’. Please consider revising the sentence or replacing this word. (Page 1: lines 25-28)

Response 5: Thank you very much. We have revised all the usage “implication” into “suggestion” (Page 1: lines 25)

Point 6: Please check the syntax of the sentence, i.e: ‘to maintain […] or to recover’ (Page 2: line 52)

Response 6: Thank you very much. We have modified the syntax, and added “to” in this sentence. (Page 2: line 51)

Point 7: The reviewer cannot understand the revised text. The authors imply that the resilience of each city is characterized by different levels, which may be influenced […]. Please revise if necessary. (Page 2: lines 58-59)

Response 7: Thank you very much. We believe that this sentence has affected readers' understanding of the paper, so we have deleted this sentence. (Page 2: lines 57-58)

Point 8: Please use the numbers correctly with parentheses, i.e. ‘Taking four (4) sub-provincial…’ (Page 2: line 75)

Response 8: Thank you very much. We have revised the numbers (Page 2, line 71)

Point 9: Please elaborate a little bit more on the sentence: ‘The key to urban resilience is to resist various risks.’ The term risk describes the exposure to danger. One cannot resist to the probability of being exposed, but can either reduce this probability or mitigate the impacts. To the reviewer’s understanding, the key is the effective response and not the resistance to risks. (Page 3: line 125)

Response 9: Thank you very much. Your understanding is correct. In fact, this sentence has been deleted in the first round modified version. According to your suggestions, we have modified the following sentence. Now the sentence is “From the perspective of effective response to risk and disaster,……” (Page 3: lines 117-118)

Point 10: Please use the numbers in parentheses, i.e. ‘study is conducted on four (4) cities in Northeast China’ (Page 4: line 156)

Response 10: Thank you very much. We have revised the numbers (Page 3, line 143)

Point 11: Please use the numbers correctly, i.e. ‘from five (5) sub-systems’(Page 4: line 165)

Response 11: Thank you very much. We have revised the numbers (Page 4, line 151)

Point 12: Please consider the use of the word connections. The reviewer understands that the authors mean ‘similarities’ (Page 4: line 165)

Response 12: Thank you very much. We have revised it (Page 4, line 151)

Point 13: Please consider elaborating a little bit more or omitting the seemingly redundant sentence: ‘The entropy method is based on the characteristics of entropy’. (Page 7: line 253)

Response 13: Thank you very much. This sentence has been deleted in the version of first revision round, but it may not be obvious in the revised format.

Point 14: Please consider the phrase ‘evaluating object’. To the reviewer’s understanding the authors refer to the evaluated object/value or the object to be evaluated. (Page 8: line 287)

Response 14: Thank you very much. We have revised the phrase. (Page 7: line 266)

Point 15: Please consider the phrase ‘evaluating things’. To the reviewer’s understanding the authors refer to the observations to be evaluated. (Page 8: line 288)

Response 15: Thank you very much. We have revised the phrase. (Pages 7-8: lines 268-269)

 Point 16: The authors are advised to revise the phrase: ‘appropriate value’, because it is vague. The reviewer suspects that what the authors meant here is a synonym to standard value (Page 8: line 295)

Response 16: In fact, He is not a standard value. Generally, this value will be determined based on the application of the model in the paper. However, when taking He values, it is required that this value should not be too large, otherwise it will affect the reading of the cloud image. Therefore, it is up to the author to refer to existing literatures and select a suitable value. This paper also referred to other literature for He value selection, but we believe that the previous expression is not standardized. We have revised it to “suitable value”. (Pages 8: lines 275)

 Point 17: Please use the numbers correctly (Page 11: lines 341-345)

Response 17: Thank you very much. We have revised the numbers (Page 10, lines 321-324)

Point 18: Since the authors have conditionally set the super-entropy value to 0.001, which is also correctly presented in Table 4, please revise the statement: ‘the Ex highest point of resilience of cloud drops in each city is concentrated near (0.500, 0.039, 0.005)’. How is the super-entropy value of 0.005 derived? (Page 12: lines 349-350)

Response 18: Thank you for your suggestion. In fact, the super-entropy value is determined by the author based on the situation of the paper when drawing the cloud image. But the evaluation criteria mentioned in this paper (0.500, 0.039, 0.005) are referring to the other literature references. Therefore, the super-entropy value in the criteria is 0.005. To make the author more clear, we have made appropriate modifications to this sentence “the Ex of resilience of cloud drops in each city is concentrated near the evaluation cri-teria which is (0.500, 0.039, 0.005)”. (Page 11, lines 329-330)

Point 19: Please use the numbers correctly (Page 12)

Response 19: Thank you very much. We have revised the numbers (Pages 11-12)

 Point 20: Please use the numbers correctly, i.e. four (4) (Page 16: lines 447, 468)

Response 20: Thank you very much. We have revised the numbers (Pages 14-15: lines 420, 442)

Point 21: Please consider revising the phrase: ‘should be paid attention to’ at the end of the sentence. It is recommended to use verbs like underline, highlight, etc (Page 16: line 471)

Response 21: Thank you very much. We have revised the phrase. (Pages 15: lines 445-446)

Point 22: Please use the numbers correctly, i.e. four (4) (Page 16: line 519)

Response 22: Thank you very much. We have revised the number. (Pages 16: lines 491)

Point 23: Please check the grammatical form of the verb combine. (Page 4: line 151)

Response 23: Thank you very much. We have revised verb into “combines”. (Pages 3: line 137)

Point 24: Please consider the use of the phrase ‘in essence’. It is recommended to revise it. (Page 4: line 182)

Response 24: Thank you very much. We have deleted this phrase. (Pages 4: line 167)

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf