You said it was a ghost town, but did not accompany that statement with a reference note to a government statement that the population was zero. That might be the issue.
And after a few rejects, they might auto-blackball you.
When I attempted to explain how I came to the conclusion and references, it was dismissed by said egotistical editors. Only today, did another editor reach out to me in a polite and respectful manner (a first in I don’t know how long) regarding this work. I wrote a long reply to them outlining how the conclusions were drawn (basically asking how to reference work that cannot be explicitly linked to, which I stated was a problem). I’ll see what they say. If they say it’s a no-go, there’s no point to my editing anymore.