Empty containers are becoming an urban planner’s nightmare. Following the news earlier this year that the Hong Kong Government was urgently finding more land to fit all the empty boxes hanging around the port during the bitter container downturn, news has emerged of snaking queues of boxes lining the world’s second largest boxport, Shanghai.

Speaking at the recent Containerisation International’s 11th annual global liner shipping conference, APM Terminals’ Chief Commercial Officer Richard Mitchell said that an incredible five miles (8.04km) of empty boxes were sitting derelict in China’s financial metropolis.

Tracey Jia