Recreation and Therapy in Urban Forests—The Potential Use of Sensory Garden Solutions
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
General Comments
The article carries out a research on the aspect of Recreation and therapy in urban forests - the potential use of sensory garden solutions.
This topic is very useful and relevant in the scientific field. I consider that the article is well written and structured.
Specific Comments for Authors
- Please insert the coordinates of 15 gardens
- To help improve the information gaps presented in the article, I leave some key references to improve the quality of the article:
Kolimenakis, A., Solomou, A. D., Proutsos, N., Avramidou, E. V., Korakaki, E., Karetsos, G., ... & Tsagkari, K. (2021). The Socioeconomic Welfare of Urban Green Areas and Parks; A Literature Review of Available Evidence. Sustainability, 13(14), 7863.
Bonilla-Duarte, S., Gómez-Valenzuela, V., Vargas-de la Mora, A. L., & García-García, A. (2021). Urban Forest Sustainability in Residential Areas in the City of Santo Domingo. Forests, 12(7), 884.
Zhi-Ying, H., & Yeo-Chang, Y. (2021). Beijing resident’s preferences of ecosystem services of urban forests. Forests, 12(1), 14.
Krzeptowska-Moszkowicz, I., Moszkowicz, Ł., & Porada, K. (2021). Evolution of the Concept of Sensory Gardens in the Generally Accessible Space of a Large City: Analysis of Multiple Cases from Kraków (Poland) Using the Therapeutic Space Attribute Rating Method. Sustainability, 13(11), 5904.
Grima, N., Corcoran, W., Hill-James, C., Langton, B., Sommer, H., & Fisher, B. (2020). The importance of urban natural areas and urban ecosystem services during the COVID-19 pandemic. PloS one, 15(12), e0243344.
Wajchman-Świtalska, S., Zajadacz, A., & Lubarska, A. (2020). Therapeutic functions of forests and green areas with regard to the universal potential of sensory gardens. In Environmental Sciences Proceedings (Vol. 3, No. 1, p. 8). Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute.
Doimo, I., Masiero, M., & Gatto, P. (2020). Forest and wellbeing: Bridging medical and forest research for effective forest-based initiatives. Forests, 11(8), 791.
Solomou, A. D., Topalidou, E. T., Germani, R., Argiri, A., & Karetsos, G. (2019). Importance, utilization and health of urban forests: a review. Notulae Botanicae Horti Agrobotanici Cluj-Napoca, 47(1), 10-16.
Chiesura A (2004). The role of urban parks for the sustainable city. Landscape and Urban Planning 68(1):129-138.
-The conclusions could establish the main limitations of the article.
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
Dear authors,
Thank you for an interesting reading of sensory gardens in the urban forest context. Please regard my comments as support to improve the readability of the manuscript and enable the readers to fully enjoy the work you have done.
Title
The title can be more in line with what the paper is about and indicate what kind of Solutions – sensory gardens can serve as i.e. solution for what and whom.
Keywords: use keywords not used in the title in order to expand the range of “search” words for your article J
Introduction
There are some issues with old references and scientific anchorage i.e. on the topic of sensory gardens (lines 47 -55). Please include references from peer-reviewed journals recently published on the topics of sensory gardens – there are both USA and Scandinavia-based articles recently published on the topic of sensory and healing gardens that could be of interest. The linkage between urban forests and sensory gardens is vague. Please make a clear connection to sensory gardens and urban forest (linking session starting at line 29 to session starting at line 47). How are these linked?
Line 47 – the expression “Also the gardens are…” – by using “the” in the sentence gives an indication to some gardens previously introduced in the text. Perhaps you mean that in general gardens can be a stimulating sensory environment.
Lines 56-66: please include some international scientific references to the statements.
AIM – please write out the aim in one sentence i.e. what was done and why. It would clarify the aim of the study. As it is written now, it is too “wordy” and it seems to be two aims:
- …to show that sensory gardens are a form of diversifying the infrastructure that can enrich urban forest, including the enjoyment of all citizens. –
2)
Please consider the focus of the manuscript i.e. addressing the needs of “all users” or “PwD” – this needs to be clear throughout the manuscript. Why is it mentioned in the introduction when the aim focuses on all citizens?
Method
I would increase the readability of the manuscript if added a short description of the overall study design before 2.1. Study area
Please indicate the criteria for the selection of the gardens/study areas. How did you decide on which garden should be included, please describe the criterion? Also, please address why is it important that these are located both in towns/cities and villages?
Table 1 – please indicate the size of each setting. Please indicate if the gardens/setting is open to the public or closed. Perhaps, list the locations based on the type of environment as it seems to be of importance (see above).
2.2 study design (data collection?)
Please indicate why the data collection was conducted at the given time (June –August). Please give the reference to the “… according to a standardized form”. Also, please list the assessment criteria used in the study i.e. describe how the data was collected and in what way the locations/settings were evaluated. Then you can give the reference to the description. You need to support the readability of the method by describing in detail what was done J
Line 96-98 – I am not sure what contribution this has to the current study? Why do you refer to the results of another study in your method? Please explain.
Results
The results should be related to the aim – but here, the section starts with results related to blind and partially sighted people. Please present the results so that they match the aim of the study. Table 2 and 3 - please indicate if this is a presentation of the current (your) study or another study (references 10 and 14). Please state clearly what are the results from the current study. In the results part, only the results should be published and no concluding remarks should be entered (line 111).
Discussion
It is difficult to evaluate the discussion part in the status of the manuscript, as the method part is incomplete and not clear how the study was conducted (not applicable to only give a reference to that). Also, it is not clear if the results are the results of the current study or other studies (10, 14). There are some main headings in the results that should be introduced in the results otherwise, they seem to be taken from thin air. Looks promising but has no anchorage in the results.
Please return the manuscript with the completed section of Method and Results and then the review can move on to other parts.
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
This study is quite unique and important, focused on the sensory gardens and their definite effects for the clients!
However, please add some information as below;
- Why and how did you choose 15 gardens in this study? Please explain briefly.
- You concluded forests may be accessible for all users by implementing the idea of universal designing of all elements of recreational infrastructure. How do you approach to this target? Please add your ideas.
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
The paper is accepted for publication without any further changes required from the authors.
This manuscript is a resubmission of an earlier submission. The following is a list of the peer review reports and author responses from that submission.
