Food Trucks to Roll In to New Location for First Friday
Bigfoot Entertainment will rent space in its parking lot at Electric and Palms avenues for the trucks in an effort to reduce concerns from Abbot Kinney merchants.
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The first First Friday of 2011 will welcome back food trucks, while still keeping Abbot Kinney's sidewalks cleared of the crowds, trash and exhaust that mobile eateries are blamed for bringing.
Bigfoot Entertainment, which has an office on Electric Avenue around the corner from the Brig, will be renting out space to food trucks in its parking lot at the corner of Electric and Palms avenues for the Jan. 7 First Friday.
"My only concern is being able to mitigate an adverse effect in the community," said Matt Geller, president of the Southern California Mobile Food Vendor Association.
Electric Avenue is bordered on one side by residences, but Geller said that his group is working with Bigfoot to make sure the event is as unobtrusive as possible.
"I think with a few tweaks, we'll be able to make it a pretty good event," Geller said.
The food trucks and First Friday have had a symbiotic, if strained, relationship. As the event brought in more and more people, additional food trucks arrived. With the food trucks, came food truck followers, until Abbot Kinney merchants complained that the crowds and the stench were inhibiting the community- (and sales-) friendly atmosphere.
In December, the Abbot Kinney Merchants Association applied to the city to put up "No Parking" signs that prohibited any vehicles—trucks or cars—from parking on the street between 4 and 11 p.m. on the first Friday of the month.
The Merchants Association voted early this month to continue that policy through March.
"The open space reclaimed from enforced parking restrictions allowed tourists, loyal customers and the neighboring community to joyfully stroll the boulevard without the continuous congestion created by the food trucks," the association said in a statement.
venicepower
9:56 am on Thursday, December 23, 2010
Good work by both entities as they continue to seek a manageable non-altercation policy. Of course, any real solution must include local residents, whose input has not yet been sought by either party.
Geller's January experiment is risky. Its success has great potential - ostensibly competitive, it is also legal (as was the group's Abbot Kinney takeover). As such, it should shame "association" members into complying with their enforceable legal agreements which the city doesn't monitor. A Bigfoot failure could backfire in a way that could wrongly reflect well on the more myopic "association" members.
Apparently, the only collective word from residents is a spotty local survey. Like most things L.A., something is better than nothing.
Real success depends on the community's voice. The first player to ask wisely will win.