Comprehensive Evaluation of and Improvement Strategies for Traditional Village Ponds in Suzhou

Traditional village ponds in Jiangnan water towns play irreplaceable ecological and cultural roles, yet quantitative assessments of their protection and development status remain scarce. This study combined the Criteria Importance Through Intercriteria Correlation (CRITIC) method, the Coupling Coordination Degree Model (CCDM), and GIS-based spatial analysis to evaluate 508 ponds in 28 traditional villages in Suzhou City. The regional surface water environment baseline—CWQI (Comprehensive Water Quality Index)—had the largest weight (0.2015). Comprehensive pond scores ranged from 0.0725 to 0.5623 (mean of 0.2871). Spatially, pond management levels were higher near the southwestern ecological tourism resort and the northeastern traditional agricultural breeding area; water area quality was high mainly in the northeast, whereas revetment quality varied across Wuzhong and Kunshan. Seven coupling coordination levels were identified among the 28 villages. Type-specific strategies were accordingly proposed: consolidating advantages and enhancing water area protection in the 11 coordinated villages (132 ponds) (D≥ 0.5); upgrading revetment infrastructure in the 10 near-non-coordination villages (252 ponds); and prioritizing comprehensive improvement in the remaining 7 villages (124 ponds) (D < 0.4). The main innovation is an integrated CRITIC-CCDM-GIS framework that quantitatively diagnoses village-level ponds and translates the results into type-specific conservation strategies.