A Ways To Go On Food Trucks

I seem to have a lot of entries about dining and all of the new places going in downtown, but short of Centrepointe and 21c there is little else to speak of.  Any new offices lease their space and (sometimes) remodel, then just set up and go to town. No major announcements, no fanfare.  I guess the dining and entertainment news will have to suffice as development news.

One subject on the dining front is the movement toward food trucks and carts.  It does seem that we are again trailing the rest of the country in allowing food trucks, but we also appear to be looking at allowing them just in the downtown area.  Is this not a community wide service for which we have little or no rules?  Should not all of our ordinances apply across the whole of Fayette County?  Is downtown the only location that the food trucks wish to serve?

There are many websites which describe  the food truck situation in cities throughout America and a few of them have maps which display the locations of certain vendors, either on a semi-permanent or rotating basis.  The site for Austin, Texas is broken into several sections and shows only four food trucks in all of their downtown.  Far fewer that any other section mapped.  It also appears that their downtown covers much more territory, as one would expect for their population.

A larger population, a larger area, more density and greater diversity and only 4 food trucks to serve them.  Why are we trying to be so different?

I have heard some news reports that there is fear that food trucks could impinge upon parking spaces or loading zones for hours at a time.  I can see the concern, but I look at the timing and size of the local beer delivery vehicles as more of a problem.  Food deliveries do not seem to be a major factor for all of the restaurants and, I guess, they take place in the early morning. On my noontime walkabouts, it is the sheer number and size of the beer delivery trucks (and where they park) which I see as a deterrent to downtown traffic movement.  

One day I saw 4 or 5 extended length trailers on Short at Cheapside at one time, three were from the same distributing company.  Three truck, four or five men in one location blocking a full lane of traffic for an unknown time span.  Should we not be doing something about that?  I seriously think that the situation is worse by campus on most days.

Comments have also been made about the two announced hotels and their delivery docks or lack thereof, but our growing dining and entertainment district draws no such attention.  I believe that it should.

The proposed regulations have provisions for length of stay at any one location and the frequency with which any particular food truck may return to said locations and they all look to be centered on the downtown area.  Could that be because our suburban streets are not amenable to locating such street vendors on public property?  What should stop several of these vendors from setting up along side some of our larger parks this summer and appealing to the visitors of our evening sports or music events?  I can imagine the Big Band and Jazz series or afternoon/evening ball games with specialty foods for a quick dinner, can't you?

The discussion on food trucks looks to me to have a long way to go, but at least we have a start.

Lets Include All The Jazz Artists

Tuesday nights in the summer are reserved for the Big Band & Jazz series in Ecton Park. They have been for about 17 years. We used to take blankets and the kids, have a picnic dinner then the kids would run and play while we listened to the music. We have graduated to collapsible chairs and a bit more adult fare now that the guys are teenagers, but they still go off and play with friends.

The musical groups originally would alternate weeks, with Big Band on one week and jazz the next, but lately the schedule has leaned heavily toward the jazz. I can see a possible explanation. I think that most of the Big Band enthusiasts are dwindling in number and moving on to the Big Band in the sky. And I won't say that it is a bad thing because there are a lot of young people out every Tuesday night.

Tonight I took a good look at the crowd while I listened and Mrs. Sweeper read a book. Here we were, smack dab in the middle of the lily white 40502 zip code, listening to jazz from an all white jazz band. Again this week, a black family arrived after we did and the disabled father rolled his wheelchair into the park to enjoy the music. This made me look around for additional similar families or couples...and there were a few...very few.

Twenty years or so ago I used to frequent a place in Chevy Chase called The Bistro. They usually had a jazz trio playing in the corner of the bar area. The owners wife and a small contingent of older couples or older ladies would spend a few hours sipping drinks and listening to the musicians. The majority of these musicians were black. Sometimes, the owner chef , his wife and a few of the regulars would be invited to a small storefront restaurant on Georgetown St for a Sunday evening jam session of the local talent. You never knew who might show up or how long they might stay, but they put out some mighty fine tunes. As white folks we were a tiny minority in that place, but we enjoyed going.

So, if the long running Big Band & Jazz program can be called Lexington's showcase of the talent in that genre, where are the black musicians? I can't believe that they all left town. I doubt that they all passed on. But maybe they aren't members of the Jazz Arts Foundation.

Can anybody answer these questions for me?