Applying a logistics cluster typology in spatial planning for circularity: Lessons from a Dutch policy lab

The spatial planning of logistics is an emerging topic due to scarcity of land, environmental impacts and the transition to a circular economy. This paper proposes a policy information tool for these issues, including a new logistics cluster typology applied in suitability maps. The validity and applicability of this tool are tested in a Dutch...

The limited regional employment benefits of XXL-logistics centres in the Netherlands

In the Netherlands, a shift occurred over the last two decades from positively framed spatial-economic policies promoting the development of extra-large distribution centres (DCs) and their claimed positive employment benefits towards a critical stance questioning the benefits of such policies, fuelled by the connected debate regarding the...

The Dutch ‘Gateway to Europe’ spatial policy narrative, 1980–2020: a systematic review

Like other countries with large ports, the Netherlands developed a policy narrative to acquire a key position in global value chains starting in the 1980s, through the spatial development of its hinterland logistics complex. The negative environmental effects of logistics, such as landscape transformation and congestion, have increasingly come...

Beyond global gains and local pains: Spatial inequality of hinterland logistics

Trade infrastructure and logistical activities have long been a source of prosperity as well as nuisance. The gains and pains of logistics, however, are not distributed equally across regions and cities. Important trade hubs such as Rotterdam or Chicago have built strong trade institutions and accumulated urban wealth, hereby making a successful...

Behind the Big Box: understanding the planning-development dialectic of large distribution centres in Europe

In Europe, very large distribution centres (XXL DCs) are increasingly appearing on planning agendas due to their growing spatial footprint and environmental impacts. Although the emergence of XXL DCs has gained traction in academic research, empirical knowledge about the process that leads to their oft-debated location choice, geometry and...