The concept of a logistics center, characterizing a spatial facility with a specific purpose, was introduced based on its specific features, such as: the type of infrastructure available, the subject of activity of the enterprises located within it, and the type of functions and the associated scope of services provided to customers.
In the descriptive layer, logistics centers have been subject to many different classifications, for which their authors introduced various determinants. Due to the clarity of the role and purpose of a logistics center, it is purposeful to introduce a new classification of logistics centers, based on the definition of a logistics center and a set of additional features that were not taken into account in considerations of the problem of naming point-based logistics infrastructure.
There are various divisions of logistics centers in the literature. Their authors adopt different classification criteria, and the most frequently recurring ones include: ownership, range of influence, size, type of transport handled, type of cargo handled, etc., which have been collected in the paper. Table 1 shows the existing classification criteria and their characteristics. The existing divisions of logistics centers, collected in the paper, from the current perspective, enriched by the practical experience of recent years, are becoming impractical because some of them do not relate to reality. In particular, the following classification divisions of logistics centers are becoming outdated:
1. Division based on the range (radius) of influence, dividing logistics centers into:
-
international
-
regional
-
local.
Justification: The globalization of economic cooperation, the internationalization of supply chains, and the way customers are served by logistics service providers mean that products can be delivered from a single location to both distant and local markets. This is not determined by administrative and territorial divisions, but by factors such as the quality of available transport infrastructure, required delivery time, and total costs. The division of logistics centers based on the area of influence is also artificial because an enterprise providing logistics services will not limit their range just because the place where it conducts its business is referred to as a local logistics center. This type of division is justified for the distribution network of a specific enterprise, which, due to conditions related to the need to ensure the required availability of its goods, maintains stocks in a network of warehouses: central, regional, and local.
The article comes from the magazine “Logistyka” 4/2008.