Dry Port Concept Diffusion on the US East Coast

Paper in proceeding, 2019

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the activities related to implementation of dry ports at five U.S. East Coast seaports; these activities are then analysed considering diffusion of innovation attributes.  Data for the study were collected through face-to-face interviews at seaports of Miami, Everglades, Jacksonville, Savannah and Charleston. The concept and reality of dry ports has evolved in the past decade, in response to growing global containerized transport and it has been recognized that there are three components to successful dry port concept: on/near-dock rail, reliable inland rail connection and a functional inland intermodal facility.  These three components have different stakeholders, many of whom are unknown to one another; however, when operating in coordination with one another, create the innovation of the dry port concept. If the attributes of successful innovations are understood then they can be managed to contribute to the successful implementation of dry ports.