‘A Deeper Channel Floats all Boats’: The Port Economy as Urban Growth Engine

David Jaffee
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David Jaffee: Department of Sociology and Anthropology, University of North Florida, Jacksonville, FL 32224, USA

Environment and Planning A, 2015, vol. 47, issue 4, 783-800

Abstract: This paper analyzes an urban growth strategy revolving around port logistics. The growing significance of port economies is linked to the larger process of globalization and the increasing geographic distance between the points of production and consumption. Transportation and logistics emerge as a potential growth scheme for cities and regions that seek to develop ‘logistics clusters’. The analysis is based on the case of Jacksonville Florida, and the effort by public and private officials to identify and promote the maritime port as an engine of growth. This case study considers the efficacy of the growth machine model in understanding this urban development process as well as the limitations of this approach when applied to a development strategy based on the ‘strategic coupling’ of the urban economy with global supply chains under conditions of intense interport competition. The requirements of the port logistics sector for large-scale publicly financed infrastructure projects and the modification of the natural environment for commerce pose unique challenges and uncertainties for this development strategy.

Keywords: urban economic development; port logistics; infrastructure (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:envira:v:47:y:2015:i:4:p:783-800

DOI: 10.1068/a140346p

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