PONE-D-21-10954

An Intelligent Optimization Method for Highway Route Selection based on Comprehensive weight and TOPSIS

PLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Liu,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process.

Please submit your revised manuscript by Jun 20 2021 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

• A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the academic editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'.
• A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.
• An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.

If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols. Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols.

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Dragan Pamucar

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Journal Requirements:

When submitting your revision, we need you to address these additional requirements.

1. Please ensure that your manuscript meets PLOS ONE's style requirements, including those for file naming. The PLOS ONE style templates can be found at

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/file?id=wjVg/PLOSOne_formatting_sample_main_body.pdf and

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/file?id=ba62/PLOSOne_formatting_sample_title_authors_affiliations.pdf

2. Please amend your list of authors on the manuscript to ensure that each author is linked to an affiliation. Authors’ affiliations should reflect the institution where the work was done (if authors moved subsequently, you can also list the new affiliation stating “current affiliation:….” as necessary).

3. We note that [Figure 2] in your submission contain [map] images which may be copyrighted. All PLOS content is published under the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 4.0), which means that the manuscript, images, and Supporting Information files will be freely available online, and any third party is permitted to access, download, copy, distribute, and use these materials in any way, even commercially, with proper attribution. For these reasons, we cannot publish previously copyrighted maps or satellite images created using proprietary data, such as Google software (Google Maps, Street View, and Earth). For more information, see our copyright guidelines: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/licenses-and-copyright.

We require you to either (1) present written permission from the copyright holder to publish these figures specifically under the CC BY 4.0 license, or (2) remove the figures from your submission:

3.1.    You may seek permission from the original copyright holder of Figure 2 to publish the content specifically under the CC BY 4.0 license. 

We recommend that you contact the original copyright holder with the Content Permission Form (http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/file?id=7c09/content-permission-form.pdf) and the following text:

“I request permission for the open-access journal PLOS ONE to publish XXX under the Creative Commons Attribution License (CCAL) CC BY 4.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Please be aware that this license allows unrestricted use and distribution, even commercially, by third parties. Please reply and provide explicit written permission to publish XXX under a CC BY license and complete the attached form.”

Please upload the completed Content Permission Form or other proof of granted permissions as an "Other" file with your submission.

In the figure caption of the copyrighted figure, please include the following text: “Reprinted from [ref] under a CC BY license, with permission from [name of publisher], original copyright [original copyright year].”

3.2.    If you are unable to obtain permission from the original copyright holder to publish these figures under the CC BY 4.0 license or if the copyright holder’s requirements are incompatible with the CC BY 4.0 license, please either i) remove the figure or ii) supply a replacement figure that complies with the CC BY 4.0 license. Please check copyright information on all replacement figures and update the figure caption with source information. If applicable, please specify in the figure caption text when a figure is similar but not identical to the original image and is therefore for illustrative purposes only.

The following resources for replacing copyrighted map figures may be helpful:

USGS National Map Viewer (public domain): http://viewer.nationalmap.gov/viewer/

The Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth (public domain): http://eol.jsc.nasa.gov/sseop/clickmap/

Maps at the CIA (public domain): https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/index.html and https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/cia-maps-publications/index.html

NASA Earth Observatory (public domain): http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/

Landsat: http://landsat.visibleearth.nasa.gov/

USGS EROS (Earth Resources Observatory and Science (EROS) Center) (public domain): http://eros.usgs.gov/#

Natural Earth (public domain): http://www.naturalearthdata.com/

4. Please upload a copy of Figure 3, to which you refer in your text on page 10. If the figure is no longer to be included as part of the submission please remove all reference to it within the text.

[Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.]

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Partly

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

**********

2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: N/A

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

**********

3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

**********

4. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

**********

5. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: Greetings,

The paper needs to be corrected to make it better.

The results of the research should be in the abstract. Materials and Methods should be corrected for example see the following papers:

Pamucar, D., & Ćirović, G. (2018). Vehicle route selection with an adaptive neuro fuzzy inference system in uncertainty conditions. Decision Making: Applications in Management and Engineering, 1 (1), 13-37.

Liu, F., Aiwu, G., Lukovac, V., & Vukic, M. (2018). A multicriteria model for the selection of the transport service provider: A single valued neutrosophic DEMATEL multicriteria model. Decision Making: Applications in Management and Engineering, 1 (2), 121-130.

Noureddine, M., & Ristic, M. (2019). Route planning for hazardous materials transportation: Multicriteria decision making approach. Decision Making: Applications in Management and Engineering, 2 (1), 66-85.

Blagojević, A., Vesković, S., Kasalica, S., Gojić, A., & Allamani, A. (2020). The application of the fuzzy AHP and DEA for measuring the efficiency of freight transport railway undertakings. Operational Research in Engineering Sciences: Theory and Applications, 3 (2), 1-23.

Kasalica, S., Obradović, M., Blagojević, A., Jeremić, D., & Vuković, M. (2020). Models for ranking railway crossings for safety improvement. Operational Research in Engineering Sciences: Theory and Applications, 3 (3), 84-100.

Algorithms cannot be results. Algorithms are a paper methodology. Correct this and better explain the methodology. The selection Discussion and empirical research is debatable. First is the Case study, then the results. There is no discussion. The results are incomplete. One result must be obtained with the TOPSIS method, and then a sensitivity analysis must be performed, in order to exclude some criteria, etc. It is necessary to make scenarios and then discuss all these results.

The conclusion should include the most important results, research limits and guidelines for future research.

Adjust the paper according to the guidelines.

Reviewer #2: First of all, the paper “An Intelligent Optimization Method for Highway Route Selection based on Comprehensive weight and TOPSIS” aims and scope match those of PLOS ONE, so the paper is adequate for this journal. This paper presents an application of TOPSIS for route selection selection. However based on my opinion it needs substantial improvements to be considered for publication in PLOS ONE. I would suggest a series of changes that in my opinion would improve the paper, in special for the reader.

- I suggest the authors to improve the introduction section. Authors should better highlight the objective of their work and to what extent it contributes to close a gap in the existing literature and/or practice. What is the innovative value of the contribution proposed by the authors?

- In introduction section authors should provide more information about existing MCDM models used in the field and their benefits/weaknesses.

- Why you have used TOPSIS method? Why not RAFSI, MABAC, MAIRCA, VIKOR methdos? This should be discussed. The authors need to discuss their contributions compared to those in related papers. The authors must clearly discuss the significance of the research problem in the first section.

- Add separate literature review section. You should provide more recent references published in last two-three years. Remove references published before 2017.

- The authors should explain why they insist in practically using the Comprehensive weight model. Why not LBWA, FUCOM or BWM models?

- You should provide step by step calculations for provided methodology, especially Comprehensive weight model. You should explain in detail this methodology.

- Explain in more details in the data used in the case study, the data for the testing, the criterion for the accuracy, and others to claim these points.

- Validation section is missing. How we can judge about these results? Comparisons with existing algorithms from the literature is missing.

- Discussion section is missing. How should we know about the quality of these solutions? Could you compare these results with some existing approaches in literature? The improvement must be discussed.

- The conclusion section seems to rush to the end. The authors will have to demonstrate the impact and insights of the research. The authors need to clearly provide several solid future research directions. Clearly state your unique research contributions in the conclusion section. Add limitations of the model. No bullets should be used in your conclusion section.

Reviewer #3: This paper constructed a comprehensive weight and an intelligent selection algorithm for traffic scheme optimization. Firstly, the authors established an evaluation index system considering the factors of the whole of life cycle. Secondly, the AHP method is used to determine the index weight, and the authors proposed the comprehensive weight algorithm based on subjective and objective factors. Finally, the TOPSIS method is used to rank the schemes. An application illustrates the effectiveness of the proposed method. However, there are some points the author needs to consider as follows:

1. It is suggested that the authors introduce the organization of this paper in the end of introduction.

2. Page 9, line 5, “and each scheme m has a quantitative value B_{ij}” should be “and each scheme has a quantitative value b_{ij} for each quantitative index”.

3. Page 10, line 16, “and f_i^k is the importance of indicator F_i^k compared with indicator F_j^k” should be “and f_{ij}^k is the importance of indicator F_i^k compared with indicator F_j^k”.

4. Page 11, formula (7), what does the symbols “x_{ij}, max(x_j), min(x_j)” stand for? Maybe they are “d_{ij}”, “max_j(d_{ij})” and “min_j(d_{ij})”.

5. Page 12, formula (14), what does the symbols “f_i” and “z_{ij}” stand for?

6. Page 12, formula (15), “where \\rho reflects the decision-maker’s preference for objective or subjective weight.” Does it reflect the preference of decision makers for objective or subjective weights here? The higher the value of \\rho is, does the decision maker prefer subjective weight or objective weight?

7. Page 12, in theorem 1, “formula (10)” should be “formula (15)”.

8. Page 13, in step 3, “formula (18)” should be “formula (16)”.

9. It is suggested that the authors compare the proposed comprehensive weight method with existing comprehensive weight methods.

10. It is suggested that the authors add a sensitivity analysis with variable \\rho.

Based on these comments, I suggest MAJOR REVISIONS before its acceptance.

**********

6. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

Reviewer #3: No

[NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.]

While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step.

An intelligent optimization method for highway route selection based on comprehensive weight and TOPSIS

PONE-D-21-10954R1

Dear Dr. Liu,

We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements.

Within one week, you’ll receive an e-mail detailing the required amendments. When these have been addressed, you’ll receive a formal acceptance letter and your manuscript will be scheduled for publication.

An invoice for payment will follow shortly after the formal acceptance. To ensure an efficient process, please log into Editorial Manager at http://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/, click the 'Update My Information' link at the top of the page, and double check that your user information is up-to-date. If you have any billing related questions, please contact our Author Billing department directly at authorbilling@plos.org.

If your institution or institutions have a press office, please notify them about your upcoming paper to help maximize its impact. If they’ll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team as soon as possible -- no later than 48 hours after receiving the formal acceptance. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information, please contact onepress@plos.org.

Kind regards,

Dragan Pamucar

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation.

Reviewer #1: All comments have been addressed

Reviewer #2: All comments have been addressed

Reviewer #3: (No Response)

**********

2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

**********

3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

**********

4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

**********

5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

**********

6. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: Greetings,

The authors followed all the suggestions. The paper should now be accepted for publication.

All best

Reviewer #2: The authors have addressed the point of my concern. I am happy with their corrections. Hence, I would like to recommend this manuscript to be published.

Reviewer #3: The authors address the issues of the previous version well. But there are still some minor problems.

1. In formula (7), “max(d_j)” ”min(d_j)”should be “man_i(d_{ij})”and “min_i(d_{ij})”. “d_j” is defined in formula (10).

2. In formula (13), “sum_{j=1}^{m}w_l=1” should be “sum_{j=1}^{m}w_j=1”.

3. In formulas (23) and (24), “f_{ij}” should be “z_{ij}”, “f_j^+” should be “z_j^+”, f_j^-” should be “z_j^-”.

**********

7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

Reviewer #3: No