Understanding Social Spaces in Tourist Villages through Space Syntax Analysis: Cases of Villages in Huizhou, China

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This study used the space syntax tools to analyze the influence of street network space on the regional social interaction preferences of rural community populations. I like this paper very much. My only suggestion is to enlarge the font sizes of the figures.

Author Response

Dear reviewer, thank you very much for your constructive comments and valuable recommendations on our research. We have carefully revised the manuscript according to the comments and suggestions, and our responses to these comments are listed below:

According to the suggestion, we enlarged the font sizes of the figures in our manuscript.

Reviewer 2 Report

The article is quite interesting. It provides solid results based on a solid methodology that is well explained in the article. Overall the article is well written, english language is almost perfect and is well structured. My only two main concerns are:

1. Sustainability. The article is up to be published in MDPI Sustainability and not once the word sustainability is used in the text. It would be interesting to have the connection to sustainability both in the introduction/literature review and conclusions. What has been written on both chapters goes in the direction of a more sustainable community, a more sustainable tourism and an overall more sustainable urban design of touristic small villages and rural areas.
Has this connection been made before? If so, cite it. If not, mention it on chapter 1 and on conclusions there’s the opportunity to connect both issues and develop its possible relationship based on the results.

2. Figure 2, 3 and 4 maps are really small. Impossible to read in a printed version and even on a screen a lot of zoom is required. Image and legend resolution also needs to be improved. I suggest bigger images, with better quality., perhaps one village per page in an horizontal layout.

Additionally, figures should appear after being cited on the text. That doesn’t happen on figures 4, 5, 6.
Figure 1 is not mention in the text at all.
Figure 5 even appears in a different subchapter and it is only mentioned in the next subchapter.
Figure 6 is divided into a, b and c but when mentioned in the text is just “Figure 6”.  I understand the division but it should also be clear on the text.

- LINE 48: Considering the last sentence “Other contemporary researchers…”, I would suggest not starting the next sentence with “Gehl…”. I would suggest “The impact of urban open space on street vitality from the a perspective of social interaction has also been an active topic of research [9].” This is just a very minor correction that didn’t sound very good while reading.
- LINE 269: I would change the world “basically” and re-write the sentence. Maybe use the word “similar” or a synonym to better explain how the results are… practically consistent with the observations.

Author Response

Dear reviewer, thank you very much for your constructive comments and valuable recommendations on our research. We have carefully revised the manuscript according to the comments and suggestions, and our responses to these comments are listed below:

According to the suggestion, we pointed out in the chapter 1 of the manuscript that previous studies lacked focus on the connection between urban spatial sustainable design and rural spatial design.

Meanwhile, in the conclusions, it is pointed out that the meaningful of this study is to apply the sustainable concept of urban space research in the rural contexts and get different results from the urban research.

In addition, we also revised the opinions on the revision of figures and words expressed by the reviewer.

Reviewer 3 Report

The article seems to me to be well rooted in the literature. It is a solid empirical study well written,  responsibly argued, and inovative. It uses syntax indices to charaterize social activity in three vilages in china. We learn from the article that the most accessible streets may attract more pedestrain but social activities are performed in secondary streets were they achieve privacy and a quiet environnent with no disterbances. The study state of the art is to show that social activity is not concentrating in the most accessible streets but in side streets. This result makes sense but is less emphasized in the literature. I suggest accepting the article with almost no changes regardless the English that I am not qualified to evaluate. 

One point I wonder Is the conclusion that spaces for social activities should be planned in side streets like suggested or close to main streets in yards that supply privacy?

Author Response

Dear reviewer, thank you very much for your constructive comments and valuable recommendations on our research. We have carefully revised the manuscript according to the comments and suggestions, and our responses to these comments are listed below:

According to the suggestion, we re-checked the English expression of the manuscript and pointed out that the social space of the villagers should be planned away from main roads to increase the privacy of social spaces.