Food Truck Flurry

The beginning

of a new era

The Yacht Club in Fayetteville was one of the first communities in the area to create a gathering of mobile vendors. It is located at 617 North College Avenue, across from Starlight Skatium.

Vendors include 2 Fish 5 Loaves (Italian comfort food), Zuppa Zuppa Soup Kitchen (gourmet soup, artisan breads, salads), Kona Coast (fish, pork and shrimp tacos), Bouchee (savory and sweet French baked goods), Lo's Sweet Treats and Other Eats (sandwiches and desserts) and apparel vendor Street Side Studio (new and vintage clothing and decor).

Fayetteville is gaining another mobile vendor court at 372 W. Dickson Street, in the patio between Jose's and (most recently) the former Phoenix bar on Dickson Street.

The city of Fayetteville Planning Commission approved the ordinance Tuesday for a mobile food court with a conditional use permit for two years.

The food truck court, named Shulertown, has signed up several mobile food vendors including Baller Foodtruck, Burton's Comfort Creamery, Feltner Brothers, Great Dang Pies and Tamales, Greenhouse Grille, Momma Dean's Soul Food on the Fly and Shakedown StrEAT Grill.

The facility will have permanent water and electricity for the vendors, with an agreement with 21st Amendment to share restroom facilities for vendors and their employees.

Shulertown is owned and managed by local Zac Wooden, who also owns 21st Amendment, Los Bobos Taqueria and Roger's Rec.

The name Shulertown is an homage to a former Arkansas Industrial University (now the University of Arkansas) student, T. Fred Shuler, who ran the Live & Let Live drugstore from 1901-1905. Shuler was well revered by the students, who called the area surrounding the drugstore Shulertown.

Where there is growth,

there is regulation

The rise in mobile vendors in the area sparked conversation with the city council and new regulations were passed March 18 by the Fayetteville alderman. The new laws created short and long term permit guidelines, vendor court conditional use processes and guidelines for operating on public and private property. The new ordinance for the Food Truck Lottery can be reviewed on the city's website.

Among the changes, vendors are permitted to set up a temporary shop on private property in one location for up to six months, previously limited to 90 days.

One of the most discussed topics is if the vendors will be allowed to use public spaces to sell their goods. The framework for these permits include requiring the food trucks to parallel park and relocate every four hours.

Splitting hairs

or justified jurisdiction?

Of the lottery on May 1, there were six businesses, out of 17, that were selected to receive permits for food trucks that could operate in accordance with the limited time permit on public property. May 19, all of the approved vendors were disqualified for operating a food trailer, as opposed to a food truck. The distinction was drawn between a trailer that is pulled behind a vehicle and a "motorized and operationally self-contained single vehicle equipped with facilities for cooking and selling food," as stated in the permit definition.

This distinction did not go without controversy. The owner of Frickin Chicken, Clayton Scott, was initially approved for a permit but was denied 2½ weeks later over the truck vs. trailer issue.

"By the deadline for application, we submitted a check for $100 and every document required to apply for the permit for which we had won opportunity to apply. We also started investing upgrades to our trailer and bought a pickup large enough to pull it," Scott wrote in a blog.

Scott went on to write that the verbiage of the ordinance was modified from the amendment handed out at the city council meeting. Furthermore, the $100 check for the permit application was not returned.