Who Shapes the City? Governance, Resistance, and Urban Regeneration in Sant’Ana Hill

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The paper brings interesting findings on the revitalization of institutional voids within the city limits that are often neglected in the research landscape. The paper is very interesting, but it would benefit from detailed elaboration and clear and achievable research aims.  

Line 29- I would advise mentioning the ecological shifts as well. 
Line 32- adaptive reuse is a much more common word than repurposing (as used in the abstract). 
Lines 53-55: the references are a bit dated- more recent scholars are dealing with these topics. 
Lines 65-72: The text is left in bold. There are many words in the following part that are in bold as well. This is not a common practice.

Line 85: I have doubts when deregulation is placed together with PPP. Deregulation is an effect, not a cause as such. 

Line 101: It is not clear why only Ankara and Jakarta were mentioned. The same goes for all other cities mentioned in the following part. 

The shift in 1.2.4 is too sudden. The case study can be introduced under the methodology section. 

The figures are of different quality. Authors should adopt the same graphical language for the paper. 

1.4. Methodological roadmap should be listed under the Methods section (most of the text is repeated again, which should be avoided).  After line 272 general paper structure could be introduced as it becomes very hard to follow. 

The methodology section introduces both research strengths and limitations in a detailed manner.

Line 394:I would advise authors to avoid words such as “it is now time to…” 

The research section could benefit from much more detail and elaboration on each method used. I have an impression that this case study deserves a book rather than an article. Accordingly, only general findings were introduced, which is a shame, and it lacks depth. I honestly believe authors have much more results. Additionally, field searches with maps are missing. 

If we go back to the research aims, these are my impressions and recommendations for the authors:
- Analyze the urban transformation of Sant’Ana Hill and identify the institutional,  economic, and political factors that shape its redevelopment: The urban transformation lacks detailed elaboration; institutional, economic, and political factors could be clearly identified and listed. As the research phase includes a period of more than a decade, transformation phases with drawings could and should be identified. 
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-  ii. Investigate the role and efficacy of public participation in influencing planning decisions - This is identified to a certain extent but lacks details about objections nature and influence to the planning documents and decisions made. 
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-  iii. Evaluate the impact of fragmented governance structures on urban planning uncertainty - evaluation was not conducted. Evaluation requires a systematized approach and a specific evaluation framework. 
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- iv. Draw policy lessons for future regeneration projects, emphasizing integrated governance, genuine public engagement, and adaptive heritage reuse - I honestly believe that authors and readers knew this before reading the article - more depth that resulted from the research would be very beneficial and could have a large impact in the field. 

Each of these three goals could be addressed in individual research articles as well. 

Comments on the Quality of English Language

English, especially the terminology used should be improved. 

Author Response

Dear reviewer, all the responses are in the attached table. many thanks for all your time and attention provided. 

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Summary

The paper describes research into the redevelopment process of Sant’Ana Hill in Lisbon, Portugal. The area contained six hospitals which date from the time of the 1755 Lisbon earthquake. The study analysed the players involved in the redevelopment including the urban planners from the Lisbon City Council, architects, policymakers, heritage and cultural organisations, media, and the community activists who were involved in the issue. The redevelopment process commenced well with recognition of the heritage value of the buildings and of the need for community housing, however it shifted to one dominated by real estate interests intent on extracting the maximum return from the redevelopment.

Assessment

This is a fascinating study and the authors are commended for the exhaustive investigations they conducted among the multiple players involved in the redevelopment. It is very unfortunate that the real estate interests refused to participate and be interviewed but this does not detract from the worth of the paper.

The study aimed to determine the institutional, economic and political factors that shaped the redevelopment and in particular the role played by public participation in influencing the process. While the process of urban redevelopment has been intensively studied as documented well in the Introduction, this paper captures the full range of players and interests including the public and heritage aspects which is rare among the existing literature. The case study of Lisbon is unique in that the six hospitals being redeveloped were extremely old and their heritage value is therefore very high. The lack of input from the real estate interests is an area that should ideally be addressed and the authors recognised this.

The paper identified four important policy lessons covering 1. public participation, 2. the need for stable urban policy frameworks, 3. that heritage sites need to be re-purposed for public and social uses, and 4. the governance bodies need to be better integrated to avoid conflicting policies. While I agree with the second, third and fourth lessons, their proposal to “ensure that citizen input directly shapes redevelopment strategies” elevates public participation from Arnstein’s token consultation level to a level of citizen power which is rather idealistic and probably unrealistic. However, the authors are commended for their inclusion of policy recommendations which are extensive.

The Introduction surveys a large number of references across the various aspects of urban redevelopment and with a total of 50 references is very comprehensive. The references are used extensively to provide the theoretical background for the study. Self-citation is not an issue.

The study’s methodology employed a wide range of means for gaining its information including policy document review, semi-structured interviews, reviews of Newspaper reports, advocacy group statements, and city council debates, and on-site visits. It would be difficult to add anything to these, they should provide an almost complete source of data with the exception of the real estate interests. The authors do not state the availability of the data to other researchers which should be rectified. Nor do they state any conflicts of interest. Given access to the comprehensive database, the study should be reproducible.

The four figures are clear and of sufficient size to be legible. Figure 3 of the study area would benefit by the inclusion of an inset map showing its central location within the entire city of Lisbon. The English is quite satisfactory.

Specific Comments

Line 294-312 essentially duplicates Line 276-284. Suggest these be combined.

Author Response

Dear reviewer, all the responses are in the attached table. many thanks for all your time and attention provided. 

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Interesting topic, of great importance for planning and heritage protection. The article is well written, concise, with a sound structure and methodology. Few suggestions for improvement are mentioned below:

Connect the governance challenges in Sant’Ana Hill to classical democratic theories or theories of social order. This will provide a stronger analytical foundation. Also, briefly introduce key democratic principles (e.g., procedural fairness, equal opportunity for participation, transparency, accountability) and how urban planning ideally embodies these. Then, frame the Sant'Ana Hill case as a challenge to these principles. Expand the discussion of neoliberal governance (Harvey, Smith) by referencing AI’s role in exacerbating market-driven planning (e.g., algorithmic bias in land-use decisions). Explore the Role of Technology: Was technology used to facilitate participation (e.g., online forums, virtual meetings)? If so, how effective was it, and did it exacerbate existing inequalities (digital divide)? Finally, expand a little more on the "Quality" of Participation: Analyze the quality of the public discourse. Was it informed, respectful, and inclusive of diverse viewpoints?

Author Response

Dear reviewer, all the responses are in the attached table. many thanks for all your time and attention provided. 

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

I  appreciate authors revised version of the paper and answers to the comments from the first round. Anyhow, most of the comments that are of substantive value were not used to revise the manuscript. 

Author Response

Thanks again to reviewer 1. We have added the answer to this round 2 in the attached file.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx