The public has an appetite for food trucks but Victoria isn’t ready yet to serve them up, says Mayor Dean Fortin.
Fortin had hoped to announce Thursday a pilot project in conjunction with Robbins Parking that would have allowed food trucks to operate on city parking lots.
But there are just too many outstanding issues to allow it to happen this year, Fortin said.
“There’s a lot of questions that as a public body we have to answer [first]: Is there competition? Is it in the right spot? Have we got the right value as opposed to the private sector?” he said.
Victoria has licensed 26 mobile food vendors — everything from trucks parked on private property to a few grandfathered food carts allowed to operate on Government Street.
Food carts are allowed to set up on private properties in Victoria that are commercially zoned but the city is under pressure to allow more on public property, both from startups wanting to get a toehold in the food service industry and from people looking to add vibrancy to the downtown, Fortin said.
“We recognize there’s an interest as a way to animate our streets. … There’s many great things about it. But there’s also a lot of barriers within the City of Victoria on how to move forward on that.”
Fortin expects Robbins to continue to look for spots in its private parking lots where foot carts are a good fit.
“Robbins is going ahead and the city’s going to have to catch up as soon as it can,” Fortin said.
“We were looking to move it forward quickly given that summer months are really part of it, but we recognize that given all of the issues that are landing on council’s table that we may have to put it off to the fall.”
The issue of the food carts will be discussed during council’s next priority setting session, he said.
View Victoria rolling food vendors in a larger map
