Food trucks’ contribution to the built environment
By: J. David Chapman/September 13, 2018
Citizens Bank of Edmond’s Heard on Hurd is Saturday night. This monthly street festival will be celebrating all things local in downtown Edmond with proceeds benefiting Turning Point Ministries. Turning Point Ministries is a faith-based ministry providing affordable housing options to qualified individuals and families in Edmond.
This month’s festival will also celebrate the life of Chad Sparks, owner of Sparxx Sliders, who recently died. Chad had entered the food truck industry and became one of the festival’s most popular and dedicated food truck participants. If you haven’t attended this event, take this opportunity to see how a first-class festival is conducted and see one of the most vibrant downtowns in the state.
Food trucks have been an integral, necessary component to the success of this long-running Edmond festival. I frequently get questions about the impact of food trucks on the built environment and local restaurants. The short answer is positive to both. Their first impact is on placemaking, which has been an essential component of rebuilding the urban fabric in American cities. Food trucks have been an integral part of placemaking in these urban environments. At a time when the urban city centers had little or no bars and restaurants, food trucks contributed to keeping those attending events in downtown.
Secondly, we have witnessed a significant number of the more popular food truck concepts rent brick-and-mortar facilities, using the truck to prove the concept before taking the riskier permanent alternative. This also allows property managers and building owners to get a feel for the food concept and business owner before leasing to them.
As good as the food truck industry has been in building community, they face some challenges. The renewal effort in most city centers in the United States is now a decade old and critical mass now exists for brick-and-mortar bars and restaurants to be profitable and thrive. What does this mean for the food truck industry and are food trucks going to be relegated back to their humble origins of the nation’s fairgrounds, events, company picnics, and festivals? Possibly, but first they have helped ignite the next thing – the food hall. Next week, I will talk about the emergence of the food hall.
J. David Chapman is an associate professor of finance and real estate at the University of Central Oklahoma (jchapman7@uco.edu).