Automation in maritime container terminals is gaining momentum as the advantages in terms of total life cycle costs have become apparent in western countries. However, expertise and experience in the design, development and operation of automated terminals is still limited. Many stakeholders or actors are involved in the design process and the entire process is supported by a substantial amount of documents created by different actors. These actors cover a wide range of perspectives, use specific information carriers and terminology, and have their own interests while having sometimes little understanding of the interests of others. A common framework of understanding is lacking which makes the communication within the design process problematic, and could result in suboptimal designs. Currently tools like simulation and animation are used to support communication in the design process. These tools are costly to use, have long throughput times to develop and often do not have an accurate realistic representation of the design. We propose to use a 3D visualization environment to present the design of automated terminals. This virtual environment, called the Virtual Terminal, can be used as a common framework for understanding and as a communication medium. The Virtual Terminal should overcome the disadvantages of the tools that are currently used. By automating the generation of 3D environments of container terminals based on CAD drawings and by using this virtual environment as a framework to structure existing knowledge, the Virtual Terminal can support decision makers throughout the decision making process. To evaluate the Virtual Terminal a case study is presented on the design process of a state-of-the-art automated container terminal.