City considering loosening Toronto food truck rules
If you own a food truck or just wish you saw them more often, here's a glimmer of hope to brighten up your Wednesday: city staff are recommending that council loosen the restrictions governing trucks in the city.
A staff report released yesterday advises that the city should consider relaxing some of the heavily-contested food truck laws unveiled last spring, which allow food trucks access to a few scant curbside parking spots downtown - after they pay $5,000 for a permit. The three-hour parking limit in pay-and-display spots - which, food truck operators complained, was heavily truncated by setup and takedown time - would be increased to five hours.
The report also advises rolling out partial-season six- and nine-month permits so that operators can access those spots during the summer and still save cash during the colder months.
Caplansky's owner Zane Caplansky, an outspoken advocate for looser truck rules, told the Globe and Mail the report was "a step in the right direction".
He added, however, that the report still doesn't address the reason why the permit-approved spaces are so scarce in the first place: The rule that stipulates food trucks must be parked more than 50 metres away from an existing restaurant (which blacks out most of the downtown core).
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