This article was originally published on Jacksonville Business Journal.

Jacksonville is one of the top cities for logistics infrastructure, according to a ranking done by Global Trade Magazine.

The city, which shares the list with cities like Miami, Los Angeles and Memphis — as well as lesser-known logistics cities like Peoria, Illinois and Orangeburg, South Carolina — based on factors like Jacksonville's port, the two interstate highways, the rail infrastructure, the international airport and its ability to bring freight to a large amount of people in a short amount of time.

Patrick Dooley, editor at Global Trade Magazine, said Florida in general is a key state for logistics.

"Florida is a fantastic logistics state because of its positioning and shape," Dooley said. "When people thing of Florida logistics, they think of Miami first. We wanted to give Jacksonville some credit."

Dooley said the list was in no particular ranking, but wanted to provide its leaders — experts in global trade, exporting and manufacturing — some knowledge they knew and knowledge they wouldn't have known before.

"Our readership will come to this report and ask themselves how can this help them," he said. "So we started with categories people may be interested in. It's unarguable that Memphis, Los Angeles and Miami are some of the top. But Jacksonville absolutely can hold its own."

As far as being below some of the biggest names in logistics, Dooley speculated that it was really just an issue of volume that Jacksonville isn't at the forefront of everyone's minds. Because it shares so much of its activity with the other ports in Florida, it may always be behind a city like Memphis.

Still, despite the competition, he said it was important to give the city its fair due.

"We wanted people to know Jacksonville had great infrastructure," he said.