This paper enacts a dialogue between planning literature on polycentric urban regions (PUR) and port geography literature on multi-port gateways. The main proposition is that polycentric systems are the emergent outcome of the interactions between three dimensions of polycentricity: morphological, functional and institutional. The focus is on the Dutch-Belgian Amsterdam-Rotterdam-Antwerp (ARA) port-industrial region: one of the world's largest concentrations of oil refining and petrochemical activity. The central question is to what extent is the ARA region a polycentric system and what explains this observed polycentricity? Our analyses demonstrate a high degree of morphological and functional polycentricity with each of the constituent (firms located in) ports connected through flows and specialization in processing and trading oil (products). However, this is not the intended result of formalized spatial planning, nor did the ARA ever became a frame of reference among planning agencies. Rather, it is the result of self-organization in the oil industry that has culminated in the emergence of the ARA as an internationally recognized spot market, later institutionally formalized in delivery contracts (oil futures) traded on international commodity exchanges. We conclude that polycentric systems could be understood as emergent systems that obtained generative capacities, in turn influencing its different constituting dimensions.

Commodities are the lifeblood of the world economy. They are shipped globally in enormous quantities in both volume and value. Yet what is often ignored by transport geographers and (maritime) economists alike is the way commodity markets themselves function and how the performance of these markets influences the demand for freight and, as such, the geography of waterborne transportation. In this chapter we argue that the waterborne transportation of commodities is nested in a complex system; one that is defined by price movements and by transactions across manifold agents that engage in some form of risk in the physical supply of essential production inputs. Based upon a complexity perspective on commodities trading, we present an alternative mode of analysis about the functioning of waterborne shipping of commodities in increasingly volatile markets defined according to optionality and risk.

Arguably one of the most successful planning concepts of the Dutch Randstad is the mainport Policy which began in the 1980s. This policy proposed national advocacy for economic growth through the support for the upgrading of the infrastructure of the port of Rotterdam and Amsterdam Schiphol Airport. Dutch (public) support for the hub and transit functions of the mainports continued to weaken, more so since 2010. This chapter traces the political history of the notion of the mainport, from its conception into discourse and how it relates to our understanding of the Randstad. Since the 1980s the national spatial-economic planning policy with regard to Randstad Holland has been very much interlinked with a so-called 'mainport' or 'gateway strategy'. The various initiatives have already culminated in a mutual Maritime Capital of Europe Agenda endorsed by the Rotterdam Maritime Board that represents executives from the wider port community in order to create momentum for Rotterdam as a dynamic port-city ecosystem.

This chapter is about understanding the role that commodity traders play in the world city network. Commodity trade is crucial in shaping economic globalization, both in the form of physical exchange of goods and in the form of financial transactions. Some older geographical thoughts on the role of traders and trade in shaping urban fortunes, most notably the work of James Vance (1970), are presented. These insights are confronted with a detailed overview of the contemporary practices of commodity traders in coordinating global supply chains and transactions, effectively linking various markets and places across time and space. The main hypothesis we induce is that in order for commodity traders to act as global agents they prefer the concentrated agglomeration benefits offered by (world) cities.

The aim of this paper is to operationalize a relational approach to the study of port-city interfaces. A relational approach allows for the analysis of how actors are connected, transact, and assign meaning and value to regional development. Much of the literature on port-city interfaces has primarily focussed on late 20th-century transformation processes at the urban waterfront. This fails to appreciate the often-continued presence of port activity within cities and falls short in understanding how the development agendas of port cities are relationally constituted. In this paper, first we argue that the port-city interface is a relational geometry through which heterogeneous flows of actors, assets, and structures are coupled. Second, we present an analytical framework capable of operationalizing such relational approach. The contemporary relational geometries in the bio-based sectors within the port cities of Amsterdam and Ghent are taken as starting points. Analysing these reveal how different coupling mechanisms result in particular development trajectories of the port city, setting the scene for future coupling mechanisms. This paper concludes with a discussion on the value of a relational approach to the study of port-city interfaces.

Using the concept of strategic coupling, we examine the socio-economic port city interface of Ghent, Belgium. It is widely acknowledged that the recent crises has revealed to us our unfounded belief in a world of abundance, spatially as economic, where policy actions could be taken without hesitation and without limitation. These crises form a crucial test of the viability and resilience of the socio-economies of port cities around the world. The advance of rising economies in globalized markets lead to increasing international competition. Following this, port cities around the world are trying to renew or find new port city synergies, because many of the port functions are under pressure. Based on the concept of (un)related variety and the cluster-network, we build up a methodological framework capable of understanding how the complex socio-economic port city is build up and to find which actor is now connecting the dots; essential information for port city policy. We test our methodology on the port city of Ghent, an ARA port with several important clusters, combining the assets of the port and the city. Using these results, we will show that although the diversity, also the at first sight socio-economic success of Ghent is threatened by the current challenges. Based on this, we propose some policy recommendations.

This chapter illustrates the complexity of gateway-corridor development, uses Canada as an example. The term 'gateway' has been applied in town planning, retail and residential development, tourism planning and trade facilitation. The Canadian case of gateway-corridor development is an example of multiple gateways on different coastal ranges competing for infrastructure support in the gateways and in the transportation corridors linking to the main hinterland. The Federal government of Canada has recently initiated a public policy entitled National Policy Framework for Strategic Gateways and Trade Corridors. The Asia-Pacific Gateway as a formal designation had its roots in the creation of the Greater Vancouver Gateway Council (GVGC) in 1994. In October 2005 the Federal government introduced the Pacific Gateway Act with the intent that the legislation would establish policy and a governance foundation through the creation of a Pacific Gateway Council to bring about what the GVGC had been espousing for over 10 years.

Jacobs W., van Rietbergen T., Atzema O., van Grunsven L. and van Dongen F. The impact of multinational enterprises (MNEs) on knowledge-intensive business services (KIBS) start-ups: empirical evidence from the Dutch Randstad, Regional Studies. This paper focuses on the impact of multinational enterprises (MNEs) on the level of entrepreneurship in knowledge-intensive business services (KIBS) in metropolitan regions. Large globalizing metropolitan regions or world cities' are generally considered prime office locations for MNEs and KIBS alike. Certain locations in these metropolitan regions or world cities provide multifarious benefits of being co-agglomerated. Yet the impact of local MNEs, whether domestic or foreign, on successful local entrepreneurship in related KIBS has hardly been conceptually or empirically addressed in the literature. This paper presents evidence from the Dutch Randstad based on a questionnaire given to 2,000 KIBS firms founded in 2001-08 and supported by interviews with major international KIBS. The main conclusion is that MNEs in KIBS firms spawn successful entrepreneurship in KIBS. Implications for regional development policy are also addressed.

The rise of global supply chain systems and geographical dispersion of related inland logistics centres has led to a new phase in the evolution of port systems, referred to as port regionalisation. While this process largely results from the decisions of shippers and logistics providers, the scope of public policy can also shape it. This includes the strategic capacity of stakeholders to couple not only locally available assets with the needs of global flows, but also to provide meaning through the constitution of symbols, frames and discourses. We propose the application of a relational perspective to port regionalisation, which allows us to analyse how various actors engage strategically in actor-networks and coalitions across scales to stimulate growth based on logistics. This is accomplished by presenting the rise of Venlo in the Netherlands as an inland logistics hub within the corridor of the port of Rotterdam.

Strategic coupling refers to the process of matching local assets with global network demands. Although the concept has benefited from an increase in relational thinking, several critical issues remain unresolved. In this article, we identify and discuss three such issues – the characteristics of the entities involved in strategic coupling, the way in which the ‘local’ is conceptualized in the context of ‘global’ positioning, and the understanding of strategic action. To address these issues, we use Cox's notion of ‘spaces of dependence and engagement’ in combination with Ball's concept of the ‘structure of provision’. The case of the port of Rotterdam demonstrates the value of our perspective in elucidating the process of ‘strategic coupling’ within global networks of containerized traffic.

Port research is not a new field of interest for human geographers, evidenced by numerous conceptual models and empirical cases of port evolution and development in the literature. However, several critical questions remain unanswered, notably the exact position of port geography as a subdiscipline within human geography in the past, present and future. Based on a pluralistic approach, the paper analyzes the changing waves and development of port geography as a sub-discipline of human geography, with a special focus on whether port geography has experienced a paradigm shift and, if so, when, why, and how. Also, through analyzing the major terrains of port geography research from the macro perspective, it brings a new lease of life to port geography in this rapidly changing world. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Chinese national fiscal reforms and the transfer of power from the central government to local governments impact the governance of inland waterway transport (IWT). In this paper we argue that the development of IWT on the Yangtze River is strongly influenced by institutional changes at different levels of government in line with the path dependent transformation of the Chinese centrally planned economy. This paper deduces how institutional change of IWT on the Yangtze fails to fulfil its purposes because of institutional legacies and conflicts of interests among the various levels of government and the persistent interwovenness of the state with private enterprises (via SOEs). In order to further stimulate IWT on the Yangtze more institutional changes are on the cards, in particular a need for more (foreign) private involvement and more independent SOEs, but these changes will not necessarily break out of the development path. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

This Windows on the Netherlands addresses the economic geography of commodity trade by providing insights from two Dutch port cities: Rotterdam and Amsterdam. It is argued that commodity traders provide an empirical site for uncovering the missing links between research on world cities on the one hand, and global commodity chains on the other. Commodity trading is compelling as it is linked both with the financial sector (financing and paper trade) and with the production and distribution of commodities (storage and transportation). However, these two activities do not necessarily need to be in geographical proximity. Rotterdam and Amsterdam handle large volumes of commodities flowing through their ports, but the trading desks of the large commodity houses handle the trade transactions. There is a strong presence of the world's largest commodity traders in the Netherlands, which include not only the port-based physical-operational functions but also the trading desks, treasuries and holding companies. The paper concludes with an overview of avenues for further research.

It has been argued that the relationship between knowledge-intensive business services (KIBS) and multinational enterprises (MNEs) within the regional economy is advantageous for urban and regional dynamics. It is likely that KIBS aim to locate proximate to (internationally operating) MNEs because of agglomeration externalities. The impact of MNEs on the birth of KIBS has rarely been examined, and the research on the new formation of KIBS has mainly adopted a case study approach, thus limiting the opportunity for generalization. We have taken a more quantitative approach using a continuous space framework to test whether proximity is important for the co-location of KIBS and MNEs in the metropolitan area of Amsterdam in the Netherlands. Our results, controlled for other location factors, indicate that KIBS are co-agglomerated with MNEs and that the presence of a MNE significantly influences the birth of KIBS nearby, but the effect on such start-ups is considerably smaller than the positive effect of the presence of already established KIBS. We discuss the implications for urban and regional development strategies and policy initiatives.

Scholars from a broad range of disciplines have extensively examined port cities, both historic and contemporary. Transport and economic geographers have focused on the position of ports in spatially extensive supply chains and global production networks, the regionalisation of logistics activity and port governance reform. Architectural and planning practitioners, as well as historians of the built environment have explored waterfront transformation as the frontline of urban regeneration and as part of the shift to a post-industrial economy. Social and urban geographers have examined the redevelopment of waterfronts for high-end uses/users, as well as the displacement of the urban working class.As a result, port cities are now studied through different (disciplinary) perspectives that tend to amplify the mistaken impression that ports and cities are solitudes of unconnected actors and stakeholders. An integrated analysis of the complex inter- section of these disciplinary perspectives and a comprehensive analysis of diverse aspects of port cities has yet to be undertaken: this analysis must link research into the built environment, metropolitan spatial form, urban planning actors, methods, and case studies to economic network analysis. At the 2013 meeting of the Association of American Geographers in Los Angeles, our multidisciplinary group hosted four consecutive panels with presenters from a broad range of disciplines, each presenting research conducted in the Americas, Europe and Asia. Discussants and audience hailed from numerous disciplines and various parts of the world. This multidisci- plinary approach provided a larger framework in which the participants and audience engaged in exciting discussions on the multiple implications of the mobility of goods, people and ideas and their impact on physical form in port cities.Arguing that ports, waterfronts and their cities remain closely interconnected despite the structural changes in global trade, shipping and logistics that have trans- formed their spatial and functional-economic relationships, these four sessions also aimed at gaining new insights into the form and function of port cities and their larger hinterlands. We invited scholars to present papers on port cities that critically assessed the fraught but dynamic relationships that exist between ports, waterfronts and urban development. We also encouraged participants to reflect on current theoretical devel- opments in their specific fields, to discuss theoretical and methodological approaches, as well as the inherent conceptual implications in interdisciplinary research on port cities, and to critically assess past, current and emerging port cityscapes through a range of global case studies.Redevelopment: transformation of waterfront, ports, port cities and their hinterlandsOur first session brought together papers focused on the redevelopment of active ports at the intersection of changing global networks and technologies, and how these changes played out in social and physical transformation on urban waterfronts and in ports, port cities and their hinterlands around the world. The presenters used various lenses and locations to engage with the topic. Anne Wessels (University of Washington) used an Actor Network Theory' approach to examine the intersection of 'discursive and material elements' in a contemporary assemblage of the Tacoma, WA, waterfront as 'urban blue space'. Using field studies as well as textual analysis, she aimed to assess the various systems of meaning, activity and socio-ecological patterns of that space. Hemalata Dandekar [Cal Poly State University) complemented this approach through an exploration of the historical and contemporary intersections of port and city in Mumbai. Building on a longer historical overview of the growth of port facilities, docks and railways, as well as its textile industry, banks and finance centres, she explored the multiple transformations of Mumbai. …

This paper addresses the fraught relationships among commodity trade, urban economic development and the environment in the world’s largest rainforest reserve, in a historical narrative fashion. The conceptual framework in which we position this narrative is provided by Hesse (2010), in the “site” and “situation” dimensions of the interaction between places or locales on the one hand, and material flows or global value chains on the other. It is argued that the assemblage of both site and situation is what shapes the wealth of cities. The case study of Manaus and Belem shows how the rapid urbanization of the Amazon rainforest is accompanied by the growth of shipping as “new” commodities are being extracted from the jungle interior.

This paper addresses the fraught relationships among commodity trade, urban economic development and the environment in the world’s largest rainforest reserv...