Review Reports - Uncovering Governance Pathways in the Residential Reuse of Military Brownfields in Hungary

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The paper addresses a timely and underexplored topic and makes a valuable contribution by examining the social outcomes of military brownfield regeneration through a mixed-methods approach. The combination of a national database, longitudinal census data, and qualitative case studies is a notable strength, and the governance perspective provides an original framework for interpreting regeneration trajectories. However, to further strengthen the manuscript, I encourage the authors to address the following points:

Clarify the limitations of the governance framework. The paper operationalises governance mainly through changes in ownership. While this is a pragmatic and transparent approach, ownership does not fully capture the complexity of governance arrangements. The manuscript would benefit from acknowledging this limitation and discussing other dimensions of governance that could not be considered.
Discuss the limitations of the qualitative evidence. The case studies are supported by a relatively small number of interviews conducted exclusively with institutional actors. A brief discussion of the potential implications of this choice would improve the methodological transparency of the study.
Qualify the interpretation of social outcomes. Occupational structure is a reasonable proxy for social change, but it does not directly measure processes such as gentrification or displacement. The authors should acknowledge this limitation and adopt slightly more cautious wording when interpreting these phenomena.
Moderate the causal claims. The findings convincingly show an association between governance arrangements and different social trajectories. However, the conclusions would be more robust if they recognised that other contextual factors may also influence regeneration outcomes and that the evidence supports plausible mechanisms rather than definitive causal relationships.

Author Response

Comment 1: Clarify the limitations of the governance framework. The paper operationalises governance mainly through changes in ownership. While this is a pragmatic and transparent approach, ownership does not fully capture the complexity of governance arrangements. The manuscript would benefit from acknowledging this limitation and discussing other dimensions of governance that could not be considered.

Response 1:

We thank the reviewer for this constructive observation and fully agree. We have clarified during the revision that the ownership trajectory is used as a transparent and replicable proxy for the balance of public and private agency across the full sample, and not as a synonym for governance. Two additions were made. First, a passage was added to Section 3.2 explaining that a municipality may in principle steer redevelopment through non-ownership instruments (planning controls, affordable-housing requirements, negotiated conditions), but that these instruments are comparatively weak in the post-socialist Hungarian context of centralised planning and fiscally residualised local government system, the ownership trajectory is therefore treated as the single most consequential and consistently documented governance decision available for the whole sample. Second, an explicit limitation was added to the concluding section acknowledging that the governance dimensions can not be captured solely by an ownership-based approach and reframing the typology as a parsimonious first-order structuring rather than an exhaustive description of governance arrangements.

Comment 2: Discuss the limitations of the qualitative evidence. The case studies are supported by a relatively small number of interviews conducted exclusively with institutional actors. A brief discussion of the potential implications of this choice would improve the methodological transparency of the study.

Response 2:

We agree, and we have improved the methodological transparency of the qualitative component. Section 3.4 was expanded to state how respondents were selected (i.e. officials with direct governance responsibility for the case sites), how the transcripts were analysed, and how the interview evidence was triangulated with site observations. The revised text makes explicit that, given their small number, the interviews function as corroborative, mechanism-tracing evidence alongside the statistical analysis rather than as an independent qualitative dataset. In addition, a dedicated limitation was added to the concluding section acknowledging that the exclusively institutional vantage point does not represent the perspectives of residents or private developers, and noting this as a direction for future research.

Comment 3: Qualify the interpretation of social outcomes. Occupational structure is a reasonable proxy for social change, but it does not directly measure processes such as gentrification or displacement. The authors should acknowledge this limitation and adopt slightly more cautious wording when interpreting these phenomena.

Response 3:

We agree, and we have modified the interpretation of the social outcomes of regeneration throughout the text. Three basic changes were made. First, we adopted more cautious wording where trajectories were interpreted: the transitional case is now described as being consistent with market-driven social upgrading rather than as a clear sign of gentrification driven by displacement. Second, we added a paragraph distinguishing the two possible non-exclusive mechanisms that are consistent with the observed occupational shift, namely the displacement of lower-status residents and/or the influx of higher-status newcomers to the area, occupying newly built upmarket housing. Both processes can play a role. Third, a paragraph was added clarifying that occupational composition is an indirect indicator of possible gentrification and displacement, and not a direct measurement.

Comment 4: Moderate the causal claims. The findings convincingly show an association between governance arrangements and different social trajectories. However, the conclusions would be more robust if they recognised that other contextual factors may also influence regeneration outcomes and that the evidence supports plausible mechanisms rather than definitive causal relationships.

Response 4:

We agree, and we have moderated the causal claims accordingly. The interview evidence is now presented as supporting inference to plausible mechanisms rather than as proof of definitive causal relationships, and the corresponding sentence in the Discussion was reworded. We also added a limitation recognising that regeneration outcomes are co-determined by contextual factors that the present design controls only imperfectly, and confining the conclusions to the cases examined while distinguishing patterns the evidence supports from mechanisms that remain hypotheses for further research.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Following the large-scale withdrawal of military forces, land use in Central and Eastern Europe has undergone significant changes, and the redevelopment of military brownfield land has become a research topic warranting further study. This study selected 67 sites converted to residential function from a total of 316 former military sites. Based on occupational data from the 2001, 2011, and 2022 censuses, and supplemented by semi-structured in-depth interviews in four case study locations, the study analyzed the governance models and social impacts of the transition of Hungarian military brownfield land to residential use. Overall, the research topic is well-defined and the structure is sound; the subject matter holds significant practical relevance and policy value. The authors conducted thorough data collection and systematically cataloged former military sites nationwide, providing a relatively reliable empirical foundation for the study. However, the manuscript still has considerable room for improvement in terms of theoretical framework construction, data processing, and case selection. Therefore, a major revision is suggested.

1. A notable shortcoming of the manuscript is that it directly equates whether the government retains plot ownership with its level of governance involvement. Based on this premise, the authors classify military brownfield land into four categories: market-dominant, municipal-led mixed, transitional, and passive municipal reuse. This classification appears somewhat arbitrary. In fact, even after land privatization, the government can still exert strong intervention in the redevelopment process through hard constraints such as planning controls, affordable housing mandates, the provision of public facilities, and soil remediation acceptance.

2. Regarding the theoretical framework, the authors need to further clarify the logical relationships among residential segregation, social mix, and gentrification.

3. The criteria for assessing social consequences (particularly social mix) should not be based solely on the single indicator of occupational structure, and it is recommended that this approach be reconsidered.

4. The case studies did not include sites classified under “passive municipal reuse.”The authors explained this by stating, “The central focus of this study is on the governance arrangements between municipal and private actors, the last category was not considered during the case-study selection.”However, even when a site is wholly owned by the municipality, the direct participation of private actors (such as through cooperation or outsourcing) is often unavoidable during the construction and subsequent operation and maintenance phases. Therefore, it is recommended that cases of this type be supplemented, or the classification framework be readjusted. Overall, the selection of case study areas appears to have been intentionally aligned with predefined themes such as social exclusion, social mix, and gentrification, rather than being the objective outcome of a comparative analysis across different cases.

5. Furthermore, the scope of the case studies is relatively limited, and the current conclusions tend to focus on a case-specific description of the process of redevelopmentof military brownfield land for residential usein Hungary. It is recommended that the authors expand the discussion to distill more universally applicable academic findings.

6. The manuscript focuses on military brownfield land, which the authors clearly define in Section 2.1. However, the dataset used in the study consists of 316 former military sites, from which the authors selected “sites with pure residential function (n=20) and mixed function with residential component (n=47)”. Can the authors demonstrate that these 67 former military sites qualify as military brownfield land?

7. The locational characteristics, development value, and market potential of the sites themselves are the foundation and key influencing factors for ownership transfers and redevelopment activities by municipal authorities and private market actors. It is recommended that the relevant structural background for the case study areas be appropriately supplemented.

8. The blue and orange blocks in Figure 1 lack legend labels and need to be labeled. The first two entries in the legend for Figure 2 are duplicates. The English text in Figures 5, 7, 9, and 11 is unclear, and its readability should be improved.

9. The order of “4. Discussion and conclusion”is incorrect, and it should be “5. Discussion and conclusion.”

Author Response

Comment 1: A notable shortcoming of the manuscript is that it directly equates whether the government retains plot ownership with its level of governance involvement. Based on this premise, the authors classify military brownfield land into four categories: market-dominant, municipal-led mixed, transitional, and passive municipal reuse. This classification appears somewhat arbitrary. In fact, even after land privatization, the government can still exert strong intervention in the redevelopment process through hard constraints such as planning controls, affordable housing mandates, the provision of public facilities, and soil remediation acceptance.

Response 1:

Thank you for this comment; we partly agree with it. We accept that ownership and governance are not identical and that, in principle, a government can intervene after privatisation through measures like planning control, affordable-housing mandates, the provision of public facilities, and remediation acceptance. We have added a paragraph to Section 3.2 stating explicitly that the ownership trajectory is used as a transparent and consistently documented proxy for the balance of public and private agency across the full sample, not as a synonym for governance, and explaining why these non-ownership instruments have proved relatively weak under the specific post-socialist Hungarian context characterised by centralised planning competences and fiscally residualised local governments. We would also respectfully note that the typology is not arbitrary, its organising principle is the temporal trajectory of public versus private control, which is theoretically motivated and distinct from existing functional or evaluative typologies. This rationale has been made explicit in a new passage in the Introduction, and a corresponding limitation has been added to the concluding section.

Comment 2: Regarding the theoretical framework, the authors need to further clarify the logical relationships among residential segregation, social mix, and gentrification.

Response 2:

We agree. A new passage has been added to Section 2.3 that sets out the logical relationships among the three concepts, positioning them along a single dimension of neighbourhood social change so that they are directly comparable across governance types.

Comment 3: The criteria for assessing social consequences (particularly social mix) should not be based solely on the single indicator of occupational structure, and it is recommended that this approach be reconsidered.

Response 3:

We agree that occupational structure is a single, indirect indicator, and we have both revised our claims and made the measurement rationale explicit. In the Hungarian census, occupational composition (based on the ISCO classification) is one of the rare, but still reliable, indicators for social status that is consistently available at the census-tract level across all three investigated census years (2001, 2011, 2022). This is what made a comparable longitudinal measurement of neighbourhood social change possible. We have therefore kept occupational structure as a proxy for social change adding an explicit justification of the indicator and its category treatment in Section 3.4 and adding a limitation to the concluding section clarifying that it is an indirect measure. Importantly, our interpretive claims about social mix, gentrification, and displacement do not rest on the occupational data alone: they are corroborated by the interview evidence, which reconstructs the underlying governance mechanisms.

Comment 4: The case studies did not include sites classified under “passive municipal reuse. „The authors explained this by stating, “The central focus of this study is on the governance arrangements between municipal and private actors, the last category was not considered during the case-study selection. „However, even when a site is wholly owned by the municipality, the direct participation of private actors (such as through cooperation or outsourcing) is often unavoidable during the construction and subsequent operation and maintenance phases. Therefore, it is recommended that cases of this type be supplemented, or the classification framework be readjusted. Overall, the selection of case study areas appears to have been intentionally aligned with predefined themes such as social exclusion, social mix, and gentrification, rather than being the objective outcome of a comparative analysis across different cases.

Response 4:

We partly agree. We accept that private actors are typically involved at the construction, operation, and maintenance stages even under municipal ownership, the typology, however, classifies sites by the position of ownership and development control, not by the presence or absence of operational subcontracting, and we have clarified this distinction. On the concern that case selection was aligned with predefined social themes: we have added a passage making explicit that the cases were chosen to instantiate the governance types defined a priori from the full set of 67 sites, and that the social outcomes were measured only after selection. The connection between governance type and social change is therefore a result of the analysis, not a criterion of case choice.

Comment 5: Furthermore, the scope of the case studies is relatively limited, and the current conclusions tend to focus on a case-specific description of the process of redevelopment of military brownfield land for residential use in Hungary. It is recommended that the authors expand the discussion to distill more universally applicable academic findings.

Response 5:

We appreciate this suggestion and have expanded the discussion accordingly, while also respectfully making the case for the broader applicability of our findings. Although the empirical material is Hungarian, the governance mechanism we identify is not specific to Hungary: it is grounded in processes that the literature documents across the whole of Central and Eastern Europe. The large-scale withdrawal of Soviet forces after 1990, the restitution and privatisation of land, the recentralisation of planning competences, and the fiscal weakening of municipalities occurred in broadly comparable forms across all the post-socialist CEE countries, and the redevelopment trajectories of former military sites reported for the Czech Republic and other post-socialist countries display the same tension between municipal and market control that our typology captures. On this basis we argue that the framework and research findings are transferable to other post-socialist settings, and may be even beyond. We have clarified the scope conditions under which the framework transfers and expanded the concluding discussion to state these transferable findings more explicitly.

Comment 6: The manuscript focuses on military brownfield land, which the authors clearly define in Section 2.1. However, the dataset used in the study consists of 316 former military sites, from which the authors selected “sites with pure residential function (n=20) and mixed function with residential component (n=47)”. Can the authors demonstrate that these 67 former military sites qualify as military brownfield land?

Response 6:

We agree that this should have been stated more explicitly, and we can confirm that all 67 sites qualify as military brownfields. The national database was compiled precisely based on the brownfield definition given in Section 2.1, drawing on the relevant literature and on the authors' own research. Only sites meeting that definition was entered to the database. Accordingly, each of the 67 sites ceased its military function after the withdrawal of Soviet troops in June 1991, they remained vacant or derelict for a period, and were subsequently redeveloped for residential or mixed use. Sites that were continuously occupied and simply transferred to civilian tenancy without an intervening phase of abandonment were, by purpose, excluded.

Comment 7: The locational characteristics, development value, and market potential of the sites themselves are the foundation and key influencing factors for ownership transfers and redevelopment activities by municipal authorities and private market actors. It is recommended that the relevant structural background for the case study areas be appropriately supplemented.

Response 7:

Thank you for this comment. A new summary table has been added to the case-study section indicating the structural background of the four case sites, including their location within the city, size and local market context, so that the governance analysis can be read alongside these site-level characteristics. The accompanying text notes that these structural attributes are among the conditions that shape ownership transfer and redevelopment, and that they are considered together with the governance analysis rather than independently.

Comment 8: The blue and orange blocks in Figure 1 lack legend labels and need to be labeled. The first two entries in the legend for Figure 2 are duplicates. The English text in Figures 5, 7, 9, and 11 is unclear, and its readability should be improved.

Response 8:

We agree and we have revised the figures accordingly. Legend labels have been added to the blue and orange blocks in Figure 1.

Comment 9: The order of “4. Discussion and conclusion”is incorrect, and it should be “5. Discussion and conclusion.”

Response 9:

We agree. The heading has been corrected from '4. Discussion and conclusion' to '5. Discussion and conclusion', and the section numbering has been adjusted accordingly.

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

1. Introduction and literature - major improvements required

The manuscript does not sufficiently demonstrate how the proposed typology differs from the approaches described in the cited literature or precisely define its original contribution.

Please:

compare the proposed typology with previous approaches;
use this comparison to clarify the research gap and the manuscript’s original contribution;
remove duplicate references, particularly references [8]/[31] and [9]/[25].

2. Research design - major improvements required

The cases include one former military warehouse and three barracks complexes. Differences in their original functions and existing built structures may have affected the redevelopment process and its outcomes independently of the governance model.

Please:

justify the comparability of the selected sites;
discuss original function, existing structures, location, and development scale as possible alternative factors;
account for these differences when interpreting the results;
consistently limit conclusions derived from the case studies to former Soviet military sites.

3. Methods - major improvements required

The typology is based on initial and current ownership, although the article concerns governance trajectories evolving over time. The occupational-status indicator and the qualitative component of the study are also insufficiently described.

Please:

explain how intermediate changes in ownership and governance were incorporated into the classification;
define “mixed ownership” and explain how the level of municipal involvement was determined;
justify the selection of ISCO groups 1–2 and 7–9 and explain how groups 3–6 were treated;
describe participant selection, the analysis of the five interviews, and the use of field observations.

The term “passive municipal reuse” should also be justified or replaced with a more neutral label.

4. Results - major improvements required

The census data demonstrate changes in the population’s occupational composition but do not allow individual residents’ migration to be tracked. They therefore do not, by themselves, provide evidence of displacement.

Please:

replace claims of displacement with descriptions of changes in social composition, unless additional evidence is provided;
discuss alternative explanations, including the arrival of new residents in newly constructed housing;
clearly distinguish the statistical findings from their interpretation;
revise the interpretation of the Veszprém and Szolnok cases accordingly.

5. Conclusions - major improvements required

The four cases demonstrate the coexistence of particular governance models and changes in social composition. However, they are insufficient to establish a general causal relationship with gentrification or social exclusion.

Please:

moderate the causal language;
present the findings as conclusions derived from the cases examined;
distinguish findings supported by the evidence from hypotheses requiring further research;
define the scope within which the results may reasonably be generalised.

6. Figures and tables - improvements recommended

The figures and tables are generally understandable but require editorial consistency and clearer explanations of the categories used.

Please:

standardise the presentation of numbers and percentages;
correct the numbering and captions, including “1. Table”;
explain the categories “mixed ownership” and “passive municipal reuse”;
present values consistently across the text, tables, and figures.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

English language - improvement required

The manuscript is understandable but requires grammatical, syntactic, punctuation, stylistic, and editorial revision.

Please:

undertake a thorough language revision;
simplify excessively complex sentences;
review and standardise the terminology;

correct the section numbering and remove the residual template heading “6. Patents.”

Author Response

Comment 1: Introduction and literature - major improvements required

The manuscript does not sufficiently demonstrate how the proposed typology differs from the approaches described in the cited literature or precisely define its original contribution.

Please:

compare the proposed typology with previous approaches;
use this comparison to clarify the research gap and the manuscript’s original contribution;
remove duplicate references, particularly references [8]/[31] and [9]/[25].

Response 1:

We fully agree, and we have revised the paper accordingly. A new paragraph was added to the introduction, which compares our typology with the two existing approaches: functional typologies classifying brownfield sites by the new function(s), and evaluative typologies, which assess the governance qualities that predict regeneration success. Our typology differs from both, because its organizing principle is the temporal trajectory of public versus private control and its dependent variable is the resulting social composition of the neighborhood, this is the research gap that the study wanted to address. Regarding the duplicate of references, we have removed the duplicates and the two in-text citations were changed to [8] and [9].

Comment 2: Research design - major improvements required

Please:

justify the comparability of the selected sites;
discuss original function, existing structures, location, and development scale as possible alternative factors;
account for these differences when interpreting the results;
consistently limit conclusions derived from the case studies to former Soviet military sites.

Response 2:

We agree and we have strengthened this in two ways. First, a new summary table has been added showing the structural background of the four selected sites, covering their original function, existing built structures, location within the city, and development scale, so that these site-level factors can be considered alongside the governance model. Second, we now address the warehouse-versus-barracks difference directly: the market-dominant case is a former warehouse without an inherited residential function, whereas the three barracks already contained residential component. We argue that this asymmetry is analytically relevant rather than a confound, because the absence of an inherited social component is itself one of the conditions under which a site passes readily into market control, we take it into account when interpreting the results, and we have consistently limited all case-based conclusions to former Soviet military sites.

Comment 3: Methods - major improvements required

Please:

explain how intermediate changes in ownership and governance were incorporated into the classification;
define “mixed ownership” and explain how the level of municipal involvement was determined;
justify the selection of ISCO groups 1–2 and 7–9 and explain how groups 3–6 were treated;
describe participant selection, the analysis of the five interviews, and the use of field observations.

The term “passive municipal reuse” should also be justified or replaced with a more neutral label.

Response 3:

We agree and have expanded the methods on every point. We explain that the database records ownership at two points and that the classification captures the net governance trajectory, where intermediate stages are consequential, as in the transitional cases, they are reconstructed through the interviews. We now define mixed ownership explicitly and clarify how the level of municipal involvement was determined. We justify the use of ISCO major groups 1-2 (high-status) and 7-9 (low status) as the two socially most consequential poles and explain that data of the intermediate groups (ISCO 3-6) were not considered during the analysis, because they reflect intermediate positions in the social hierarchy. We have extended the description regarding the selection of respondent, the thematic analysis of the five interviews, and the use of field observations.

Comment 4: Results - major improvements required

Please:

replace claims of displacement with descriptions of changes in social composition, unless additional evidence is provided;
discuss alternative explanations, including the arrival of new residents in newly constructed housing;
clearly distinguish the statistical findings from their interpretation;
revise the interpretation of the Veszprém and Szolnok cases accordingly.

Response 4:

We agree and have revised the results and their interpretation accordingly. Claims of displacement have been replaced with descriptions of social change and social upgrading, the transitional case is now described as being consistent with market driven social upgrading rather than as direct evidence of displacement. We have added a paragraph discussing the alternative explanations of social change, namely the arrival of higher-status residents in newly constructed upmarket housing and noting that both mechanisms result from the same governance change. We have clearly separated the statistical findings from their interpretation, both in the results text and in a dedicated paragraph discussing the limitations, and revised the interpretation of both the Veszprém and Szolnok transitional cases.

Comments 5: Conclusions - major improvements required

Please:

moderate the causal language;
present the findings as conclusions derived from the cases examined;
distinguish findings supported by the evidence from hypotheses requiring further research;
define the scope within which the results may reasonably be generalised.

Response 5:

We agree and have substantially modified the conclusions. The casual language has been softened so that the interview evidence supports interference to plausible mechanisms rather than proof of definitive casual relationships. The findings are now framed explicitly as conclusions derived from the cases examined, and we distinguish patterns that the evidence supports from mechanisms that remain hypotheses for further research. We have also defined the scope of generalization: the framework is analytically, not statistically generalizable to similar Central and Eastern European post-socialist settings, which is influenced by the post 1990 Soviet military withdrawal, property privatization, planning recentralization and municipal fiscal weakening.

Comment 6: Figures and tables - improvements recommended

The figures and tables are generally understandable but require editorial consistency and clearer explanations of the categories used.

Please:

standardise the presentation of numbers and percentages;
correct the numbering and captions, including “1. Table”;
explain the categories “mixed ownership” and “passive municipal reuse”;
present values consistently across the text, tables, and figures.

Response 6:

We agree and have improved editorial consistency. Percentages in the text and in Table 1 have been standardized to use a decimal point, the table caption has been corrected, and the section numbering has been corrected.

Comment 7: English language - improvement required

The manuscript is understandable but requires grammatical, syntactic, punctuation, stylistic, and editorial revision.

Please:

undertake a thorough language revision;
simplify excessively complex sentences;
review and standardise the terminology;

correct the section numbering and remove the residual template heading “6. Patents.”

Response 7:

The section numbering has been corrected, and the residual template heading has been removed. The manuscript has undergone a thorough language revision.

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Accepted.

Author Response

Thank you for your comment.

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Thank you for your detailed responses and revisions. The manuscript has been clearly improved, and most of my previous comments have been addressed. However, several issues still require attention before publication.

Introduction and literature

The added comparison of typologies and the removal of duplicate references have improved this section. Please clarify whether the manuscript’s original contribution lies in developing the governance typology itself or primarily in linking this typology to changes in social composition.

Research design

The new summary of the cases is helpful. However, the differences between the warehouse and the barracks complexes should be considered more cautiously when interpreting the results. Original function, location, development scale, and local market conditions may shape the outcomes alongside the governance model.

Methods

The descriptions of the ISCO classification, interviews, and field observations have been substantially expanded. Please also:

explain how intermediate ownership changes were considered;
discuss the implications of excluding ISCO groups 3-6;
provide the source, sample size, and methodology for the newly added housing-price data, including how the site-level and city-level averages were calculated.

Results

The observed changes in occupational composition and housing prices should be consistently distinguished from their interpretation. These data do not, by themselves, demonstrate the displacement of particular residents or establish that the changes were caused by a specific governance model. Please present displacement and gentrification as possible interpretations rather than directly demonstrated outcomes.

Conclusions

This section still requires the most important revisions. Please remove or reformulate statements claiming that the interviews and census data “confirmed causal pathways,” that the governance model “determines” the outcomes, or that municipal withdrawal caused gentrification or social exclusion.

The evidence demonstrates the coexistence of governance models, changes in occupational composition, and housing-price trends. However, it does not permit causality to be established conclusively or confirm the displacement of particular residents. Please use more cautious formulations, such as “is associated with,” “is consistent with,” or “suggests a possible mechanism.”

Please also:

present the findings as results derived from the four case studies;
distinguish findings directly supported by the evidence from hypotheses requiring further research;
limit generalisation to comparable former Soviet military sites and similar institutional conditions.

Figures and tables

The numbering and presentation of values have been improved, and the new comparative table is useful. Please also:

use one consistent name for each governance category;
clarify the periods covered by the data in Table 2;
provide the source, sample size, and calculation method for the values presented in Figure 13.

Once these changes have been made, the manuscript may be suitable for publication without being returned to me for another round of review, provided that their implementation is verified by the Academic Editor.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

The manuscript is understandable but still requires language and editorial revision. Some sentences are overly complex or unclear, and the terminology and variety of English used should be made consistent. I recommend a final language review of the entire manuscript before publication.

Author Response

We thank the reviewer for the positive assessment and for the constructive comments. Each point is addressed below.

Comments 1: Introduction and literature. The added comparison of typologies and the removal of duplicate references have improved this section. Please clarify whether the manuscript's original contribution lies in developing the governance typology itself or primarily in linking this typology to changes in social composition.

Response:

We have clarified this in the Introduction. The primary contribution of the study lies not in the governance typology in itself, but in linking that typology to measurable social outcomes. Therefore, the typology serves only as the analytical framework through which this link is established rather than as a key finding in itself.

Comments 2: Research design. The new summary of the cases is helpful. However, the differences between the warehouse and the barracks complexes should be considered more cautiously when interpreting the results. Original function, location, development scale, and local market conditions may shape the outcomes alongside the governance model.

Response:

We agree and have treated these differences more cautiously. Table 2 now reports the original function, location, development scale, and local market conditions of each site, and we note explicitly, in both the interpretation of the cases and the concluding section, that these structural factors may shape the outcomes alongside the governance model. All case-based conclusions have been confined to former Soviet military sites redeveloped under comparable institutional conditions.

Comments 3: Methods. The descriptions of the ISCO classification, interviews, and field observations have been substantially expanded.

Please also:

explain how intermediate ownership changes were considered;
discuss the implications of excluding ISCO groups 3-6;
provide the source, sample size, and methodology for the newly added housing-price data, including how the site-level and city-level averages were calculated.

Response:

We have addressed all three points. (i) We now explain that the classification is based on the trajectory between the initial and the current ownership of each site, capturing the net governance trajectory rather than every intermediate transaction, where intermediate stages were decisive, as in the transitional type, they were reconstructed through the interviews. (ii) We have added a discussion of the implications of excluding ISCO groups 3-6, noting that the research focused on the changes of the relative weight of the highest- and lowest-status groups over time rather than the full occupational distribution. With this approach we were able to capture the socio-economic dynamics of the different sites. Using ISCO groups 3-6 we can only trace the average. (iii) We have added a methodological description of the housing-price data. The data are from the Hungarian Central Statistical Office (KSH), which publishes street-level annual average prices; the site-level value is the mean of the KSH street-level averages for the streets covering each site, and the city-level value is the city average. As KSH reports only averages, and not individual transactions, the number of underlying transactions is not available. Prices were converted from local currency (HUF) to EUR at a single constant exchange rate (the 2025 average) to ensure comparability across years.

Comments 4: Results. The observed changes in occupational composition and housing prices should be consistently distinguished from their interpretation. These data do not, by themselves, demonstrate the displacement of particular residents or establish that the changes were caused by a specific governance model. Please present displacement and gentrification as possible interpretations rather than directly demonstrated outcomes.

Response:

We agree and have revised the Results and Section 4.3 accordingly. Changes in occupational composition and housing prices are now consistently distinguished from their interpretation: displacement and gentrification are presented only as possible interpretations of the observed compositional and price changes rather than as directly demonstrated outcomes, and the alternative explanation, namely the arrival of higher-status residents in newly built housing, is discussed alongside displacement.

Comments 5: Conclusions. This section still requires the most important revisions. Please remove or reformulate statements claiming that the interviews and census data 'confirmed causal pathways,' that the governance model 'determines' the outcomes, or that municipal withdrawal caused gentrification or social exclusion. The evidence demonstrates the coexistence of governance models, changes in occupational composition, and housing-price trends. However, it does not permit causality to be established conclusively or confirm the displacement of particular residents. Please use more cautious formulations, such as 'is associated with,' 'is consistent with,' or 'suggests a possible mechanism.'

Please also:

present the findings as results derived from the four case studies;
distinguish findings directly supported by the evidence from hypotheses requiring further research;
limit generalisation to comparable former Soviet military sites and similar institutional conditions.

Response:

We have carried out this reformulation in full. The statement that the interviews and census data 'confirmed causal pathways' has been removed and replaced with a cautious formulation; the claim that governance 'determines' outcomes has been removed; and throughout the section the verbs 'confirmed' and 'corroborates' have been replaced. We now present the findings explicitly as results derived from the four case studies, distinguish findings directly supported by the evidence from mechanisms that remain hypotheses for further research, and limit generalisation to comparable former Soviet military sites redeveloped under similar institutional conditions.

Comments 6: Figures and tables. The numbering and presentation of values have been improved, and the new comparative table is useful.

Please also:

use one consistent name for each governance category;
clarify the periods covered by the data in Table 2;
provide the source, sample size, and calculation method for the values presented in Figure 13.

Response:

We have addressed all three points. (i) The naming of the governance categories has been standardised throughout the manuscript; the one remaining inconsistent label ('passive retention') has been corrected to 'non-market municipal retention.' (ii) The caption of Table 2 now clarifies the periods: development value refers to 2024, and development scale to cumulative residential construction over the period stated in each cell. (iii) The caption of Figure 13 and the Methods now give the source (KSH), the calculation method (site-level values are the mean of KSH street-level averages within each site; city-level values are the settlement average), the note that transaction counts are not available, and the HUF-to-EUR conversion at a constant 2026 rate.

English language: The manuscript is understandable but still requires language and editorial revision. Some sentences are overly complex or unclear, and the terminology and variety of English used should be made consistent. I recommend a final language review of the entire manuscript before publication.

Response:

We agree. The manuscript has undergone a further language and editorial revision, in which overly complex sentences were simplified and the terminology and spelling variety were standardised throughout.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx