European Ports Research Articles

Moving Films: Visualising Film Flow in Three European Cities in 1952

This article is an international collaboration focusing on three European port cities – Antwerp (Belgium), Gothenburg (Sweden) and Rotterdam (Netherlands) – in 1952, during the golden age of cinema prior to the rise of television. The objective is to test an approach for making transnational comparisons of distribution and exhibition based on film programming data. We use a mixed-method approach that combines data visualisations based on a simple network analysis and time plot visualisations. Our aim is to show how these visualisations can be helpful in characterising and comparing cinema markets in an attempt to answer the question of how films move through a city from one cinema to the other and how this flow can be characterised and compared.

Will the yellow fever mosquito colonise Europe? Assessing the re-introduction of Aedes aegypti using a process-based population dynamical model

Aedes aegypti are feared invasive mosquitoes as they transmit pathogens which cause debilitating diseases in humans. Although mainland Europe has not yet witnessed re-establishment and dispersal of Ae. aegypti populations, several urban areas along coastlines represent suitable habitats for the species. In addition, European coastal areas are characterised by high exotic species propagule pressure, due to dense international ship traffic.To assess the likelihood of establishment in order to guide surveillance and control planning, we applied a process-based population dynamical model to simulate both the life cycle and dispersal of Ae. aegypti at the local scale after its introduction through ship traffic. We selected five European ports along a latitudinal gradient by considering both environmental conditions and the economical importance of ports: Algeciras and Barcelona in Spain; Venice and Genoa in Italy and Rotterdam in the Netherlands. The model was informed using parameters relevant for Ae. aegypti biology, fine-scale temperature time-series, urban structures and road networks.According to model results, the introduction of small quantities of Ae. aegypti eggs (10−1000) has the potential to cause species establishment, high local densities and slow initial dispersal in the two southernmost study areas, Algeciras and Barcelona, whereas Genoa is at the edge of suitability. Barcelona had the highest simulated mosquito densities (584 females/ha), whereas Algeciras densities were never more than 32 females/ha, but were higher during the colder seasons. The median spatial spread of the species varied between a few hundred meters to 2 km/year and was affected by the structure of the road network, topography and urban sprawl along the coast in the surrounding of the port of introduction. The study areas of Genoa, Venice and Rotterdam were found not suitable for establishment of this mosquito species, however, climate change could create conditions for Ae. aegypti invasion in these regions in the next decades.It is commonly accepted that targeted monitoring and early control actions are the most effective methods to hinder the establishment of invasive species in new areas. Our findings and model framework may support surveillance initiatives for those European coastal urban areas which are known to have high propagule pressure and a high modelled probability of Ae. aegypti establishment.

Natural, artificial or imported? Ice supplies for the German distant-water fisheries as an example of renewable vs. fossil-fuel based supplies

From the early decades of the twentieth century the distant-water fishing fleets relied more or less completely on the use of artificially manufactured ice for the preservation of their catches. Large-scale fossil-fuel powered ice factories in the main European fishing ports provided the ice taken onboard trawlers before they left port for the fishing trip. When the fishing grounds of the Barents Sea and the Svalbard region were developed in the 1930s, bunker capacities of trawlers were no longer sufficient for a journey without re-bunkering coal or ice. Northern Norwegian ports therefore became regularly used as bunker stations for coal and ice, with huge natural ice factories being developed in northern Norway for the supply of trawlers. Those with interests in artificial ice production in continental Europe, particularly in Bremerhaven/Geestemünde, started a campaign against the use of natural ice based on the argument that natural ice was unsanitary and would cause bacterial contamination of the fish. Several authorities became involved and finally an expedition by the Reichskuratorium für Technik in der Landwirtschaft was organized to investigate the issue of bacterial contamination of ice manufactured in northern Norway. With the findings of this expedition clearly showing that there was no contamination issue with the natural ice, it became obvious that the whole campaign against natural ice was not guided by quality concerns, but by the commercial interests of German artificial ice producers. In the end, the whole story can be understood as a key example of how a fossil-fuel powered industry tried to push a competitor using a renewable resource (natural ice) out of the market, and how certain authorities were complicit in this attempt.

Core and comprehensive ports: The new challenge for the development of the Spanish port system

The characteristics of the Spanish port network, with its heterogeneity, cause the need for different specialized facilities which directly impacts the need for significant investments by the Port Authorities. These Port Authorities are the institutions in which it is articulated the Spanish port system nowadays. However, the European Union has developed the Trans-European Transport Network (TEN-T) project that classifies European ports as core or comprehensive. After this regulation, some countries have reformulated their port systems in relation to the powers of the institutions that make up this structure. Thus, Spain has to carry out this modification, but there are many factors that must be taken into account for this.The objective of this paper is to analyze the importance of the Spanish port system considering the heterogeneity of ports, the high grade of competences that have the different regions and analyses the concentration of cargo and its specialization. The methodology used are the Herfindahl Hirschman Index and the cargo specialization index. The results arise that ports with a high specialization, but lower volume cargo, would lose visibility, and could harm the specialization of the territory.

A competitive analysis of EU ports by fixing spatial and economic dimensions

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the efficiencies of ten of the leading European ports. The motivation of the research refers to the relevant topic of selection of indicators that can be involved in the comparative analysis. Concerning the theoretical model, the authors’ efforts are especially directed towards the usage of the stochastic frontier analysis (SFA) and of the data envelopment analysis (DEA). These techniques have been widely adopted for benchmarking and performance evaluation by involving indicators based on data from National Accounts. If one of these indicators, such as labour force consistency, is not available at a specific level of aggregation, detailed assumptions are needed to address this complication. The present study proposes an additive model in order to provide an estimation of ports’ economic activities by fixing the port activity boundaries and the spatial perimeter of the firms investigated. Several NUTS (Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics) levels and NACE (EU Statistical Classification of Economic Activities) codes are fixed to offer a useful comparable labour indicator. Empirical results reveal that each port area presents a combination of the NACE categories which significantly impact the efficiency that can reach very high performance values through both the SFA and DEA techniques. Since the managers can choose which sectors to improve, which particular improvement strategies to support, which specific service to add, their decisions impact this performance evaluation, and their performance can be verified through the approaches proposed.

Port City Sustainability: A Review of Its Research Trends

In recent years, with the development of society, the awareness of environmental protection for people has been increasing. While ports promote the economic development and employment levels of port cities, they also have a negative impact on the environment of port cities. The sustainability of port cities is increasingly valued. Port cities face huge challenges, and their sustainability needs to be better understood. The purpose of this article is to review research on the sustainability of port cities. We used content analysis to classify and analyze the existing relevant literature, to learn about the hotspots and deficiencies of past research, and to propose future research directions. We found that port sustainability has become an increasingly important research topic during the past ten years. From the perspective of geographic research areas, European port cities are the hot spots for sustainability research. Regarding research fields, technologies, methods and measures to promote the sustainability of port cities are popular research topics. In terms of research methods, qualitative research plays an important role in the study of port city sustainability. Finally, guidance for future research on port city sustainability is proposed according to the review results.

Internet page content analysis of north European Sea ports

This study analyses 98 Internet pages of sea ports located in Sweden, Finland and Estonia during years 2017–2019. Aim of the study is to find, how website basic design is completed (colours and languages), how slogans, environmental issues, statistics and hinterland transports are reported. Based on the analysis, it appears as rather common that sea ports follow conservative selection of colours in their websites, where blue and white are clearly most popular. Typically, English and Swedish are as the most common used language, followed by Finnish, Russian and Estonian. In some rare cases, websites are offered in Chinese or German. Larger sea ports do have clear “slogans”, where smaller ones are just having lengthy justification for their existence. Environmental issues are increasing concern among sea ports, and these are mostly mentioned in details within Swedish actors. Providing statistics varies among companies, and in some sea ports these are provided from very long time period, where in others from just previous years or then only from last year (or even at all). It is common for companies to report that they have sustainable hinterland access, railway available.

Performance trends of environmental management in European ports

This paper presents the current status and trends over time in the environmental situation of European ports, based on the results of a wide representation of EcoPorts members (90 ports). All the information presented in this research comes from the Self-Diagnosis Method (SDM), a concise checklist managed by European Sea Ports Organisation (ESPO), against which ports can self-assess their environmental management. The results provide data on a total number of 54 indicators, being the existence of an inventory of environmental legislation the indicator with the highest implementation (96,7%), followed by the existence of an environmental policy (95,7%). Waste is the environmental issue that is being more monitored by ports. Air quality continues as the top environmental priority, followed by energy consumption and noise. It is interesting to highlight the growing awareness of Climate change among ports as well as the increasing implementation of green initiatives in ports.

Dynamics and management of siltation in a macro-tidal marina: The case of La rochelle marina, France

La Rochelle marina, in the south-west of France, is one of the largest recreational port in Europe. As many ports around the world, La Rochelle marina is not spared by siltation and has to face serious dredging operations over a period of 8 months per year. Consequently, there is a big interest in determining sediment fluxes in the area and implementing measures to minimise siltation and/or to optimise dredging operations. In the present study, a three-dimensional hydro-sedimentary model (TELEMAC-3D) was calibrated with field measurements from 2014 to 2019. Analysis of the in situ measurements (turbidity, bathymetric surveys, seabed elevation) showed that the macro-tidal influence and local wind-wave regime significantly contributed to the siltation in the marina. In order to minimise the cost and time associated with maintenance dredging, multiple scenarios have been tested numerically and subsequently analysed. Numerous sediment trap configurations were defined to focus the deposition of sediment in dredged traps and constructional measures were also assessed in terms of siltation reduction (e.g. entrance closure, narrowing entrances, Current-Deflecting-Wall). Numerical simulations showed that the best solution is to create a sediment trap at the downstream corner of the marina, along the main navigation channel, to intercept sediment particles arriving from the ocean. The constructional measures as well as the use of sediment traps inside the marina are not efficient in reducing siltation. These results highlight the importance of using operational numerical model to define a more sustainable strategy to fight against siltation in a more efficient and less costly way.

From \u201cAngels\u201d to \u201cVice Smugglers\u201d: the Criminalization of Sea Rescue NGOs in Italy

Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have played a crucial role in conducting Search and Rescue (SAR) operations off the Libyan coast, assisting almost 120,000 migrants between 2014 and 2019. Their activities, however, have been increasingly criticized. The accusation that NGOs facilitate irregular migration has escalated into investigations by Italian and Maltese courts and various policy initiatives restricting non-governmental ships and their access to European ports. Although all NGOs investigated to date have been acquitted, the combination of criminal investigations and policy restrictions that has taken place in Italy since 2017 has severely hindered non-governmental SAR operations. Given the humanitarian repercussions of reducing NGOs’ presence at sea, the merits and shortcomings of the arguments underlying the criminalization of non-governmental maritime rescue warrant in-depth research. To that end, this article fulfils two interrelated tasks. First, it provides a genealogy of the accusation against NGOs and the ensuing combination of legal criminalization, policy restrictions, and social stigmatization in restraining their activities. Second, it uses quantitative data to show that empirically verifiable accusations like the claim that NGOs serve as a pull factor of migration, thereby causing more people to day at sea, are not supported by available evidence. By doing so, our study sheds new light onto the criminalization of humanitarianism and its implications.

Vremenska raspoloživost javnog terminala za intermodalni prijevoz Žilina s odabranom europskom morskom lukom

Vremenska raspoloživost javnog terminala za intermodalni prijevoz Žilina s odabranom europskom morskom lukom

Rotterdam’s sustainability strategy: a case study on municipal policies

Rotterdam houses the largest port in Europe. It is a crucial element of the city’s economy, but also a major CO2 emissions generator. Rotterdam’s municipality developed a strategy to responsibly reconcile various interests. The present article aims to show the sustainability strategy adopted in Rotterdam and its primary elements through qualitative research; municipality’s documents were analyzed and the connections between them were stated. This leads to the conclusion that Rotterdam has developed a comprehensive and coherent strategy for sustainable development. The strategy is divided in four elements: energy transition, circularity, climate resilience and a healthy living environment. All elements were developed in response to the city’s existing problems.

When Whales Meet Dolphins: Incumbent-New Venture Relationships During Architectural Disruption

We focus on tensions between incumbents and new ventures in an industry-led corporate accelerator set up to ‘self-disrupt’ the maritime logistics value chain in the context of two technological discontinuities: digitalization and energy transition. First, we explore tensions that arise in incumbent – new venture relationships where the new venture may not represent a direct substitute to the incumbent, but rather, threaten to disrupt a given sector’s architecture of value-creating functions and associated ecosystem roles. Second, we explore the dynamics that may either enable or inhibit the ability of incumbents to respond to ambiguous threats in the face of sector disruptions. We develop an inductive model to theorize about these tensions and associated response and mitigations mechanisms in industry-led accelerators. Our research setting is a European maritime port complex where we conducted longitudinal case studies of both new ventures and value chain incumbents in the maritime, logistics, transport, energy, and refinery sectors.

PROBLEMS AND PROSPECTS OF DEVELOPMENT OF SEAPORTS LOGISTIC INFRASTRUCTURE IN UKRAINE

The article is devoted to the study of the seaports of Ukraine and the identification of problems in the development of their logistics infrastructure. The purpose of the paper is to study the main problems of development of logistics infrastructure of seaports of Ukraine and determine the benefits of forming effective logistics centers based on them. The methodological basis of the study is general scientific techniques and methods. In particular, the systemic approach, method of analysis and synthesis, logical and prognostic methods. The results of the study allow us to determine that the degree of integration of Ukraine’s port industry into the international community remains low. The productivity of transport infrastructure and logistics processes are low. Seaports, of which there have been 13 in 2019, have a high investment potential due to their specialization and geographical location of the country. Much has been done by the government to develop the port industry since independence, but today there are a number of important issues, including low levels of private investment due to instability and high risk of corruption in the domestic economy, declining seaport turnover due to unreliable maritime logistics systems, imperfect tariff policy and many others. The results of the paper are the study of the experience of forming logistics infrastructure abroad, in particular in Germany and the Netherlands, and the argument for the creation of multimodal logistics centers on the basis of the Ukrainian seaports. It is determined that a special role in their formation and control over their activities should belong to state and municipal authorities. When creating a multimodal logistics center, a comprehensive approach should be applied, which covers such areas of activity as: development of the logistics services market; optimization and development of transport infrastructure (ensuring the possibility of cargo handling by different modes of transport); effective investment policy; development of trade relations; environmental protection; development of territories, creation of industrial parks and social policy (location of multimodal logistics centers near large settlements, creation of additional jobs). The support for these areas will diversify the economy of those regions, in which seaports are located, and will have an overall positive impact on the country’s economy as a whole, increase its logistics potential and competitiveness. Value/originality. A detailed analysis of the Ukrainian seaports and existing problems in the development of their logistics infrastructure provides a better understanding of the need to create powerful multimodal logistics centers and the formation of a single information space for the integration of Ukrainian and European port industry.

Sines: Território de Turismo Industrial – Inovar para a Sustentabilidade turística

O projeto “Sines – Turismo Industrial Sustentável” (STIS), operacionaliza o conceito de TI (TI) num dos concelhos, industrial e economicamente, mais dinâmicos do País. Dotado de um dos mais importantes portos de águas profundas da Europa, refinarias, centrais elétricas e indústrias altamente especializadas, beneficia ainda de um enquadramento natural de rara beleza, com as suas praias integradas num Parque Natural. O TI apresenta-se como um produto complementar ao principal produto turístico deste território, o “Sol & Mar”, maximizando as estruturas existentes, compatibilizando duas atividades aparentemente antagónicas – o Turismo e a Indústria - e aproveitando a crescente procura por experiências diferenciadas no campo do lazer em busca de mais conhecimento e retorno por parte do público em geral, contribuindo, simultaneamente, para esbater a sazonalidade, uma das principais ameaças à sustentabilidade. Este trabalho tem como objetivo contextualizar teoricamente o TI no âmbito de um modelo de desenvolvimento turístico sustentável, e apresentar o projeto “Sines – TI numa lógica diacrónica, descrevendo o processo e apresentando os resultados alcançados, desde o seu início até à atualidade.

Legal regulations for ships arriving in and/or departing from ports – Achievements and open issues

This paper gives an overview of the legal regulations on reporting formalities for ships arriving in and/or departing from ports, both on international and EU level, as well as about the solutions in the Republic of Croatia. In particular, there are analyzed the achievements of the International Maritime Organization (IMO), which represent the base for further action. The European Union has recognized the importance of an efficient and harmonized procedure for ships arriving in and/or departing from ports by adopting a range of legal instruments aimed at reducing administrative barriers for ships arriving in and/or departing from European ports. This paper especially analyzes the solutions of Directive 2010/65/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council on the official application procedure on reporting formalities for ships arriving in and/or departing from the Member States ports and repealing Directive 2002/6/EC. It also analyses Regulation (EU) 2019/1239 of the European Parliament and of the Council on establishing a European Maritime Single Window environment and repealing Directive 2010/65/EU. The reasons for the adoption of Regulation (EU) 2019/1239 shall be specifically explained. In the last part of the paper, the authors review the achievements of the Republic of Croatia in implementing measures for establishing a single national Window. By comparing the solutions contained in EU regulations and Croatian by-laws, the authors point to the existence of non-compliance and to the need for further action.

Environmentally sound Management of Ship Wastes: challenges and opportunities for European ports

Ship wastes are incidentally regulated within the regime of marine pollution and the prevention of ship-source pollution is heavily reliant on the provision of adequate port reception facilities on land. However, the coordination between these facilities and further downstream management operations is still an unresolved issue. This paper examines from a legal perspective the challenges and opportunities related to the management of wastes generated on-board vessels after they are discharged to port reception facilities. Ship wastes are studied from a European Union (EU) law perspective and the author evaluates the integration of ship waste management within wider EU waste legislation and national waste management plans.

The Role of Port Development Companies in Transitioning the Port Business Ecosystem; The Case of Port of Amsterdam’s Circular Activities

There is a gradual but clear transition towards a circular economy (CE) that will potentially have significant impacts on ports, both in their function as transport nodes and as locations for logistics and manufacturing activities. A rough appraisal of new investments in circular manufacturing activities in ports in Europe drawn from organizational reports and official webpages illustrates the (slow) development of circular activities in ports. This paper is to our knowledge the first paper which deals with the implications of CE for the business model of the port development company. We assess if and how the circularity transition affects the role and business model of port authorities as developers of port clusters. We outline a framework for analyzing the consequences of CE on the business model of the port authority. We then apply this framework to get a detailed understanding of the emerging CE ecosystem in the Port of Amsterdam, which is clearly a frontrunner in the transition, and the role of the government-owned Port of Amsterdam port development company (PoA) in developing this ecosystem. In Amsterdam, a CE ‘business ecosystem’ has emerged and continues to evolve with three types of synergies between the companies in this ecosystem: logistics infrastructure and services synergies, input–output synergies and industrial ecology synergies. We find that the spatial scale of the CE value chains in the port varies between segments and that they are generally less international than ‘linear’ value chains. The development of CE activities occupies a central place in PoA’s strategy, and PoA assumes new and active roles in advancing the circular business ecosystem, most notably through developing industrial ecology synergies and nurturing and attracting new, innovative CE companies. Finally, the circularity transition leads to changes in PoA’s business model, with an increasing focus on new services that create synergies, and a decreasing importance of the share of port dues in the total revenue mix.

A Política Portuaria Europea: os novos desafíos da gobernanza

galegoA Union Europea carece dunha lexislacion unica en materia portuaria, agas disposicions relativas as instalacions portuarias e ao funcionamento de determinados servizos tecnico-nauticos. Europa conta con mais de 1.200 portos, dos que 319 entre globais e basicos estan integrados no conxunto das Redes Transeuropeas de Transporte. Os portos desempenan un rol esencial no tocante aos intercambios comerciais da UE e no que concirne ao servizo de pasaxeiros na medida en que son nos claves na rede comercial mundial. Asi, o 74% das mercadorias extracomunitarias envianse a traves dos portos. O sector portuario europeo non e homoxeneo e repousa sobre diversos modelos organizativos. A diversidade portuaria europea, con diferenciacion significativa en canto a tamano, tipo, organizacion e forma de conectarse, fai dificil definir unha estratexia conxunta para afrontar os grandes retos actuais. O traballo aborda a analise dos avances na construcion dunha politica comun portuaria e asemade exponense as distintas concepcions cruzadas dos actores do negocio maritimo e portuario. EnglishThe EU lacks a single legislation on port matters, except for provisions concerning port facilities and the operations of certain technical port services. Europe has more than 1200 ports, of which 319 are global and basic, integrated into the TransEuropean Transport Networks as a whole. Ports play an essential role in the EU trade and passenger services, as they are key nodes in global trade networks. 74% of non-EU trade takes place through ports. The European port sector is not homogeneous and is based on different organizational models. European port diversity (in term of size and type of organizational) makes it difficult to define a joint strategy. This work addresses the analysis of progress in the construction of a common port policy, as well as the different cross-conceptions of the maritime port business agents.

Episódios de uma Europa securitária – Portos marítimos, refugiados e territórios de espera no Mediterrâneo

O Mediterrâneo é um território importante no quadro das tensões vividas pela Europa no que ao fluxo de migrantes diz respeito. Os conflitos vividos neste espaço marítimo revelam a dimensão securitária mais restritiva da União Europeia, daqui resultando episódios de boicote e de espera como aquele que ocorreu com o navio Open Arms, em 2019.