Port City Sustainability: A Review of Its Research Trends

Abstract

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.

The Need for Data Contextualization in Urban-Water Systems in Terms of Environmental and Behavioural Health

“…However, given the recent failure of behavioural change approaches given the Covid-19 pandemic [12] and the environmental impact yielded by it, approaches like the one presented by B.M. Stieb et al [13] should be brought into the spotlight, especially when urban-water systems are concerned, as highlighted also by the lack of relevant articles [14].…”

A Virtuous Circle? Increasing Local Benefits from Ports by Adopting Circular Economy Principles

“…Although research on CE has increased in recent years, there is a lack of research focusing on port cities, especially those using surveys and questionnaire data [48] rather than literature reviews, and a lack of global research, with most work focusing on case study cities or regions, mostly in developed countries. This is especially true for port cities, with Zheng et al [49] illustrating how there is a greater need for work with a more global focus, especially that which incorporates examples from Asia, Africa, and South America. The views of port authorities globally on circular economy are unclear due to the fact certain regions have been neglected in the research.…”

Advantage of a Green and Smart Port of the Future

“…Over the years, ports have become increasingly aware of the importance of their role, not only in global supply chains but also in society, an important aspect of which includes the environmental impact of their activities [8]. This is why an increasing number of ports are implementing environmental metrics to monitor the impact of their activities in areas such as air and water quality, waste generation, noise and light emissions as well as resource consumption (e.g., energy or water resources [9]).…”