In Pursuit of Local Solutions for Climate Resilience: Sensing Microspatial Inequities in Heat and Air Pollution within Urban Neighborhoods in Boston, MA

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Dear authors,   a paper entitled "micro spatial inequities", is very interesting and innovative in defining micro-spatial inequities, but undoubtedly needs to show these concerns on a map, even more so when the title talks about a case study located in a city, Boston; and is sent as a Geography paper. Some examples of these are below:   We are to develop local climate resilience solutions that counteract micro spatial inequities impacting health and well-being, we must first come to understand their extent (lines 82-84) We might illustrate the role of hyperlocal processes with extreme heat (line 99) we present a case study evaluating the extent to which (1) heat and air pollution give rise to micro spatial inequities within neighbourhoods (line 140-141) exposure across a neighbourhood’s streets.(line 142) among others In this sense, the paper has not responded to what was expected for me , perhaps because, with my geographical background,  I t had a preconceived idea and expectations that have not been accomplished.     Therefore, I think, at least, that the paper needs a major revision focusing on some of the results in a map.  

Author Response

Reviewer 1 requested the incorporation of maps to make the variability between and within neighborhoods more accessible to the reader. We fully agree with this and think it makes a valuable improvement to the manuscript. We now have added a new Figure 1 and Figure 2 (shifting the previous Figure 1 to Figure 3). The first represents the average level of each hazard as well as the within-tract variability for each hazard for all census tracts in the Boston. The second represents the street-to-street variability for a single census tract alongside two variables (canopy coverage and main streets) associated with the two hazards we examined. We have added some text into the Results and Discussion referring to these maps.

Figure 1. Maps of the distribution of hazards across tracts reveal large amounts of variability across neighborhoods in (a) heat and (b) air pollution, but also large amounts of variability within neighborhoods, as measured by (c) difference in temperature between the warmest and coolest streets and (d) the diversity of at-risk and low-risk streets for air pollution (calculated with a Herfindahl index, 1-p²-(1-p)²). Note: Variability only represented for tracts with 20 or more streets to avoid outliers.

Figure 2. Depictions of within-neighborhood variability in hazards alongside the distribution of common drivers in a single census tract in Boston. (a) Land surface temperature, (b) air pollution risk, (c) canopy coverage, and (d) classification as a main street.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

The paper under discussion, I assessed to be of good quality. The only comment that I had was about the table formatting. Table 1 is OK, but Table 2 could be formatted in a way that it consumes much less space. I also agree to the comment of the second reviewer, that a thematic map displaying the results of the study would be helpful. Even, if not the entire study area can be showed in high resolution. Small "island maps" could be used to support the interpretation of the results.

 

Author Response

Reviewer 2 requested that we condense Table 2 in some way. Though we found this difficult to do too extensively, we were able to save some space by merging parameters and standard errors into a single cell in the table. We considered condensing the number of variables and reporting a full model in SOM but were worried that most of this information is relevant to understanding the drivers of hazards. If the editor would prefer this approach, however, we are happy to consider it.

The reviewer can see the modified version in the manuscript attached.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

General comments:

The paper shows the estimation of land surface temperature and air pollution conjunction with land use records in Boston. The result is important and valuable as it demonstrates the variation of canopy and land surface condition on heat and air quality over the study region. I recommended the paper to be accepted after minor revisions.

 

Specific comments:

1.      Line 13-18: Why only the LST and AP were being investigated? Please add one sentence to highlight the importance of the parameterizations.

2.      Line 21-23: How does the correlation value of r=0.4 and r=0.16 reflect the occurrence of microspaties inequalities for both hazards? The statement is unclear.

3.      Line 423-426: The heating is caused by the amount of vehicles? Any data or previous work that support the statement?

4.     Line 456-460: Please provide evidence to support the statement. .

 

 

 

 

 

Author Response

Reviewer 3 asked that we:

• Better justify the focus on land surface temperature and air pollution in the abstract (lines 13-18). We have added that these two hazards are particularly important for community health.
• Clarify the interpretation of the correlations between heat and air pollution reported in the abstract (lines 21-23). We have reworded to make clear that the statement about microspatial inequities refers to the first set of results and that these speak more directly to the overlap between the two forms of inequities.
• Clarify a statement about traffic flow and heat (lines 423-426). We believe the reviewer misread this sentence. We state that traffic flow is driving higher air pollution risk, which probably does not require citation. We have added also that these streets tend to have taller buildings, which is a general understanding of “main” streets.
• Provide evidence for a statement about the coincidence of high heat and air pollution risk across streets (lines 456-460). We are a little confused by this request. The numbers presented there are from the data. The sentence preceding the highlighted lines says, “If we create a two-by-two table…”. We have removed this phrase in case it is misleading that we will then present such a table, which we have not created because it is more efficient to present the comparisons textually. Hopefully it is clearer that what follows are the empirical evidence for the substance of the paragraph.

All revisions are visible in the uploaded manuscript.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

I would thank to authors their comments and their improved manuscript.

 

I think that the manuscript is ready to be published.

Author Response

Thank you! We are glad that you enjoyed our incorporation of the maps and, again, thank you for the suggestion.