The rise of inland ports connected by rail and road is just beginning. It offers some tantalizing solutions to infrastructure problems that gridlock supply chains and turn highways into parking lots. Additionally, when coupled with enterprise and free trade zones they provide fertile ground for economic development. So why haven’t they caught on? Probably the most puzzling element in any discussion of the inland port system in North America is what constitutes an inland port? It should be a fairly straightforward question and maybe it was forty years ago, but no more. With the advent of containerization and intermodalism (interchangeable boxed freight on ocean, rail and road), the definition of ‘inland port’ is subject to various interpretations. In truth, the inland port concept is being defined and re-defined in North America. The idea is in many respects in its infancy, despite a massive inland port system. Ask the simple question of what is the largest North American inland port and a variety of answers will pop up. By rights the biggest North American inland port is Montreal – hands down. But the question is: is this a river port [St Lawrence] or really an extension of an ocean port? Almost the same question can be posed for any of the North American Lake ports. Is Duluth, Burns Harbor, Chicago, Memphis or Muskegon a contender for the title of largest inland port? Equally, how about river and inland bay ports like Albany, Stockton, Pittsburgh, Kansas City or Toledo, how do they rank as “inland ports”? The Port of Huntington-Tristate is frequently cited as the largest US inland port, but rarely comes up in the discussion of inland ports. Finally, there are ports like Calgary in Canada that are in every respect inland ports with the exception of access to navigable waterways. Many ports are also referred to as feeder ports in the mythic Hub and Spoke system that really never evolved in the ocean container business in North America the way that many port pundits expected. Hub and Spike The inland port system has always been a significant factor in the US transportation system. Arguably, the Port of New Orleans is the nation’s largest port because of the Mississippi River traffic.  Over the last decade, there has been a significant change in the way we look at inland ports and their function in the supply chain. The nature of the change begins with the expansion of container ports and the difficulty of moving containers off the piers. The solution for the VPA (Virginia Port Authority) and for the SCPA (South Carolina Port Authority) at Greer is to link the piers with the hinterland via dedicated rail. The inland terminal handling the multi-modal traffic becomes in effect an extension of the port. More than a traditional hub and spoke this is a hub (port) and spike in the ground where the inland port acts as the distributor of multi-modal traffic.  The advantage to the system is that it takes pressure off the oceanside terminals and at the same time reduces truck traffic to and from the piers. Finally the hub and spike model opens up the possibility for the customers to site their facilities close to the inland port in enterprise zones or FTZs (Foreign Trade Zones). This has happened in Greer with BMW (which exports a large number of vehicles through Charleston SC) and other inland ports.  Besides the actual production of goods, the inland port enables DCs to be built at a distance from the ocean terminals where the access to cheaper land and often more reliable connections is key to running a more efficient supply chain. Although a direct link to a port provides relief at the pier side, inland ports really can be developed nearly anyplace that there is a rail hub fed by sufficient intermodal traffic.  The Midwest is particularly attractive as it is a mid-point in the country and a major consuming area of imports as well as a generator of exports.   One example is the Rickenbacker Inland Port. Two Class 1 railways service the Rickenbacker Inland Port: Norfolk Southern and CSX. The majority of rail freight traveling to Columbus is international and has reached the Ohio Valley via the East and West Coast ocean ports. The Norfolk Southern Rickenbacker Intermodal Terminal, which is capable of handling more than 400,000 containers annually, would make a middle size US container port.  Kansas City SmartPort is also a good example of how rail can effectively extend “ocean ports” to inland destinations. Kansas City, after Chicago, is the most important confluence of rail assets in North America (five Class 1s) and is linked to the Asia-Pacific markets via Kansas City Southern Railways connections to Lazaro Cardenas. Dubbed the Kansas City-Lazaro Transportation Corridor, the route offers direct access to intermodal yards and companies with businesses taking advantage of FTZs and other economic zones. With the business trend moving more towards re-shoring (bringing industry back to the US to take advantage of skilled labor, cheaper land, abundant transportation and a built in market), the inland port concept can be an economic engine boosting trade, as well as facilitating the movement.  Sounds good, but in many ways the inland port schemes have rarely reached their potential. Part of the reason is intermodal is still the unappreciated stepsister to the movement of coal and other critical commodities (now shale oil and related products). But with port generated truck congestion, a lack of available land quayside, the need to exploit the intermodal model of the inland port is clear.