The role of the degree of use of the facilities in the port choice process: the Spanish dockside cranes case

Abstract

The aim of this study is to analyse how the degree of use of port facilities influences the port choice process. In order to achieve that goal, a multinomial logit model was firstly proposed and then applied to a case study. In this particular case, the relationship between the container traffic and the availability of cranes was considered for the main Spanish peninsular container ports. From the obtained results, it can be concluded that the port throughput contributes positively to attract traffic because of the economies of agglomeration and the scale and network effects achieved; however, there is a threshold of traffic beyond which the attractiveness of ports decreases. The proposed methodological approach also allows to obtain the functional form of the analysed relationship without establishing it a priori.