Projects

The impact of the migration and relocation of terminals on the environmental footprint of container ports

Port activities leaving the urban core for less congested suburban or peripheral port sites have been an enduring characteristics of port development since containerization. For ports within urban  areas this typically implies a development (downstream on a river, lateral along a coastline or outward in the sea through land reclamation) away from the obsolete facilities near the urban core to less urban locations with ample space and a better nautical accessibility.  However, there might also be forces preventing port migration. For example, existing ports and terminals might have a closer proximity and better connectivity to inland markets, and might have a better cargo generating potential. Accordingly, this project will have two main aims. First, it will analyse the drivers of migration and relocation patterns of container ports and terminals in detail by focusing on a sample of about 20 larger container ports in Asia, North America and  Europe based on both quantitative and qualitative evaluation criteria. The Potential relationships between port characteristics, migration/relocation dimensions and the drivers in view of examining whether generic port migration/relocation processes can be identified given certain port/urban characteristics and the specific dimensions of the port migration/relocation process will also be analyzed. Second, this project aims to create a methodology to measure the impact of port migration and relocation on the environmental footprint of ports and to apply this methodology on the sample of container ports and or container  terminal projects in the future.