Quantifying Road-Network Robustness toward Flood-Resilient Transportation Systems

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The topic of the paper, robustness of infrastructure in the context of flooding, should be of relevance and the paper presents some interesting ideas.

The paper, however, needs extensive re-writing and improvement. The structure of the paper is not concise and hints at a need for a better 'merging' of contributions from different authors. There are too many repetitions where the same thing is discussed in slightly different, but overlapping ways (f.ex. concerning the central concept of Robustness).  Several parts of the paper are hard to understand (to the point where it is difficult to assess the technical soundness of the paper) f.ex. mid-page 5 to mid-page 6. It includes some language issues (incorrectly structured sentences and missing words).

A large part of the paper's text is under the heading "literature review", while there is no dedicated "methodology" section. The section "Application of the framework" is, therefore, a mix of methodology,  application and description of results and also includes some additional literature references. The section is very descriptive and does not provide a very clear understanding of how the frame work was "empirically implemented".

The concept of 'betweenness centrality' and the role it plays could be described more elaborately, including some discussion related to the debate about the extent to which these measures reflects real traffic load.

In general, the introductory parts should be strengthened and cleared from redundancy, while the analysis/discussion/­conclusion parts could be expanded to provide better understanding of the process.

Author Response

Point 1. The paper, however, needs extensive re-writing and improvement. The structure of the paper is not concise and hints at a need for a better 'merging' of contributions from different authors. There are too many repetitions where the same thing is discussed in slightly different, but overlapping ways (f.ex.concerning the central concept of Robustness). Several parts of the paper are hard to understand (to the point where it is difficult to assess the technical soundness of the paper) f.ex. mid-page 5 to mid-page 6. It includes some language issues (incorrectly structured sentences and missing words).

RESPONSE: Thanks for the valuable comments. This paper is re-structured. Please refer to mid-page 5 to mid-page 6. (Row166 – 219)

Point 2. A large part of the paper's text is under the heading "literature review", while there is no dedicated "methodology" section. The section "Application of the framework" is, therefore, a mix of methodology, application and description of results and also includes some additional literature references. The section is very descriptive and does not provide a very clear understanding of how the frame work was "empirically implemented".

RESPONSE: Thanks for the valuable comments. The Literature section and methodology has been revised. The authors also add methodology section in this paper and make it concise. Please refer to row 106 -219 and row 220 – 311.

Point 3. The concept of 'betweenness centrality' and the role it plays could be described more elaborately, including some discussion related to the debate about the extent to which these measures reflects real traffic load.

RESPONSE: The authors strongly agree with the reviewer’s suggestion. Thanks for the valuable suggestions. The authors also add the concept of 'betweenness centrality' and described more about the concept of 'betweenness centrality' including discussion related to the debate about the extent to which these measures reflect real traffic load. Please refer to row 422 – 480.

Point 4. In general, the introductory parts should be strengthened and cleared from redundancy, while the analysis/discussion/­conclusion parts could be expanded to provide better understanding of the process.

RESPONSE: The authors appreciate the reviewer’s insightful comments and constructive suggestions. This paper has been significantly revised. Please refer to row 33 – 105 and row 422 – 480. 

Reviewer 2 Report

The paper is original, but problem is connected  with infractructure of big ciyies in Asia (especially China). 

The excellent review of main problem (very good digest of world literature).

Both formulae are original and reflect the inherent base of research method.

Very transparent figures and charts based on real measures.

The paper may be support for road transport emergency systems against floods and connected disturbances.

Author Response

Point 1: The paper is original, but problem is connected with infrastructure of big cities in Asia (especially China). The excellent review of main problem (very good digest of world literature). Both formulae are original and reflect the inherent base of research method. Very transparent figures and charts based on real measures. The paper may be support for road transport emergency systems against floods and connected disturbances.

RESPONSE: Thank you very much for the comments and suggestions, I appreciate your comments and suggestions. It gives me great encouragement to continue working on applying this knowledge to the development of transportation systems during floods for the benefit of society and Thailand.

Reviewer 3 Report

The article presents system for evaluation of transportation system resilience to flooding developed by the authors. It is using spatial model of the flood plain to identify areas in danger of flooding and centrality measures to evaluate impact of the flooding on the transportation system. The system is demonstrated on case study of the Chiang Mai, Thailand area.

The proposed approach seems to be interesting and potentially useful, but there are some weaknesses. First the language-wise, while most of the article is understandable, the article has significant room to improvement in this regard. There are also some problems with terminology, which seem to be result of problematic translation rather then error in judgment (see remarks and examples in paragraphs below).

In Step 2 (row 257+) I had problems with understanding what the authors mean by graphs refered in the paragraph. In step 2 when presenting the method, there is no graph. The meaning of the paragraph becomes clearer in section 3.2, where is case study. I recommend revisiting the step 2 in theoretical part of the article and add consideration on how to construct such graph, scale derivation, threshold levels, etc. Presented method should be self-contained to ease follow up studies or application of the method in different geographic locations.

Also text in rows 266-270 should be revisited for clarity.

Now smaller notes and remarks to the article:

• row 33 … have been endlessly increasing … probably not endlessly

• row 63 THB – I recommend for authors to add footnote (or any other possible explanation) of THB – I presume that Thai Baht is meant, if so unfortunately this currency is not so widely known as USD.

• Row 81 … locality systems [13] … what exactly is meant by locality systems? Referenced article [13] does actually not work with the term.

• Row 82 … harmed and damaged … is there presumption of harm for persons? From components on row 80 it does not seem to.

• Row 90 … instrumentation software

• Row 102 Chen and Wang [17] suggested that robustness is linked to being unresponsive to indecision. The article does not deal with robustness or indecision. Perhaps wrong translation?

• Row 103 … more robust or what type of uncertainty is…. Perhaps something is missing?

• Row 108 Mens and colleagues … better as Mens et al.

• Row 130 ...Flood risk systems can be interrupted … If a flood risk system is a geographic zone (r. 124) it cannot be interrupted

• r. 131 … These distractions …

• r. 189 … troubled … Influenced, under pressure?

• r. 216 - … height betweenness … probably means node or edge betweenness.

• R 217 – 220 revisit for clarity

• r. 246 Centrality models… is the word model correct in this context (shouldn’t measure be used)

• r. 287 … response curve needs to be clarified.

Please note that these are just examples not exhaustive list of all such problems. Before publishing, the whole article should undergo language correction and also terminology correction especially to ensure that it uses terms referenced in literature (and not its non standard translations).

Author Response

Point 1. The article presents system for evaluation of transportation system resilience to flooding developed by the authors. It is using spatial model of the flood plain to identify areas in danger of flooding and centrality measures to evaluate impact of the flooding on the transportation system. The system is demonstrated on case study of the Chiang Mai, Thailand area.

RESPONSE: Thank you very much for the comments and suggestions, I appreciate your comments and suggestions. It gives me great encouragement to continue working on applying this knowledge to the development of transportation systems during floods in Thailand.

Point 2. The proposed approach seems to be interesting and potentially useful, but there are some weaknesses. First the language-wise, while most of the article is understandable, the article has significant room to improvement in this regard. There are also some problems with terminology, which seem to be result of problematic translation rather then error in judgment (see remarks and examples in paragraphs below).

RESPONSE: Thanks for the valuable comment. It has been significantly revised. This article has been edited for English language by a professional and native speaker.

Point 3. In Step 2 (row 257+) I had problems with understanding what the authors mean by graphs refered in the paragraph. In step 2 when presenting the method, there is no graph. The meaning of the paragraph becomes clearer in section 3.2, where is case study. I recommend revisiting the step 2 in theoretical part of the article and add consideration on how to construct such graph, scale derivation, threshold levels, etc. Presented method should be self-contained to ease follow up studies or application of the method in different geographic locations. Also text in rows 266-270 should be revisited for clarity.

RESPONSE: The authors appreciate the reviewer’s insightful comments and constructive suggestions. This paper has been significantly revised. We make it concise and more clarify. Please refer to row 242 – 247 “Response to flooding is vital because if we can respond to flooding quickly enough, it will significantly reduce the flood impact. If we can present the response to the affected person or affected areas, it will help to respond immediately to areas of large-impacted areas. If there are no affected persons or affected areas of flooding, the system response is zero. The response depends on the level of the disturbance as well as on the system attributes.”

Point 4. Now smaller notes and remarks to the article:

Row 33 … have been endlessly increasing … probably not endlessly

RESPONSE: Thanks for the valuable comment. That word has been replaced with ‘considerably’; Please refer to row 33–34 “Floods, the most frequent natural disasters, have considerably been increasing in frequency and severity over the recent decades [1].”

Point 5. Row 63 THB – I recommend for authors to add footnote (or any other possible explanation) of THB – I presume that Thai Baht is meant, if so unfortunately this currency is not so widely known as USD.

RESPONSE: Thanks for the valuable comment. To make the introduction part to be more concise (as suggested by another reviewer), the currency part has been removed.

Point 6. Row 81 … locality systems [13] … what exactly is meant by locality systems? Referenced article [13] does actually not work with the term.

RESPONSE: Thanks for the valuable comment. It has been revised. Please refer to the row 65 – 68 “The physical components within the systems include infrastructure (i.e., guideways, terminals, and stations), vehicles, equipment, fuel, power systems, and control-communications-location systems [6].”

Point 7. Row 82 … harmed and damaged … is there presumption of harm for persons? From components on row 80 it does not seem to.

RESPONSE: Thanks for the valuable comment. It has been revised. Please refer to the row 68 “During floods, all these physical elements can be directly or indirectly damaged.”

Point 8. Row 90 … instrumentation software

RESPONSE: Thanks for the valuable comment. It has been revised. Please refer to the row 76 – 77 “It is therefore difficult to improve the robustness in the absence of standardized measuring approaches”

Point 9. Row 102 Chen and Wang [17] suggested that robustness is linked to being unresponsive to indecision. The article does not deal with robustness or indecision. Perhaps wrong translation?

RESPONSE: Thanks for the valuable comment. It has been revised. Please refer to the row 87 – 90

Point 10. Row 103 … more robust or what type of uncertainty is…. Perhaps something is missing?

RESPONSE: Thanks for the valuable comment. It has been revised. Please refer to the row 90 – 91 “Some studies regard robustness as flexibility, while others associate it with the strength to endure changes [10].”

Point 11. Row 108 Mens and colleagues … better as Mens et al.

RESPONSE: We strongly agree with the reviewer’s suggestion. It has been revised. Please refer to the row 93 “Mens et al.”

Point 12. Row 130 ...Flood risk systems can be interrupted … If a flood risk system is a geographic zone (r. 124) it cannot be interrupted and Row. 131 … These distractions …

RESPONSE: Thanks for the valuable comment. It has been revised. Please refer to the row 114 -116 “Sea storms, waves in river water reservoirs, or heavy rainfall can cause flash flooding from time to time, most of which are unlikely to cause significant damage and death.”

Point 13. Row. 189 … troubled … Influenced, under pressure?

RESPONSE: Thank you for your suggestion. We prefer to use under pressure. Please refer to the row 170 “some anticipated system characteristics under pressure [28-30].”

Point 14. Row. 216 - … height betweenness … probably means node or edge betweenness.

RESPONSE: This has been corrected. Please refer to the row 197-198 “The nodes or edges betweenness signifies that the shortest path throughout the node or edge [39]”

Point 15. Row 217 – 220 revisit for clarity

RESPONSE: Thanks for the valuable comment. It has been revised. Please refer to the row 198 – 203 “Nodes or edges having much higher values than the average appear to be more central in relation to their neighbors, suggesting that the others depend on these nodes or edges in making connections within the transportation network. Edge-Betweenness Centrality model can corporate the relative importance of roadway sections into the prioritization of post-disaster roadway networks for restoration and it is an essential part of the transportation network.”

Point 16. Row. 246 Centrality models… is the word model correct in this context (shouldn’t measure be used)

RESPONSE: Thanks for the valuable comment. To make the article more concise (as suggested by another reviewer), that section has been removed

Point 17. Row. 287 … response curve needs to be clarified.

RESPONSE: We strongly agree with the reviewer’s suggestion. It has been revised. Please refer to the row 264 “To understand system robustness, this can be explained through four characteristics…..:”

Point 18. Please note that these are just examples not exhaustive list of all such problems. Before publishing, the whole article should undergo language correction and also terminology correction especially to ensure that it uses terms referenced in literature (and not its non standard translations).

RESPONSE: Thanks for the valuable comment. It has been revised. This article has been edited for English language by a professional and native speaker.

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The manuscript has been improved significantly and is now ready for publication

Reviewer 3 Report

This version of the article presents significant improvement from both language perspective and clarity of the presented information.

I don't believe, further changes in the article are needed before publishing.