Street meat and diversity, together at last

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Gregor Robertson looks south to Portland, where parking and vacant lots are filled with hundreds of carts offering tasty, diverse foods rooted in countries and cultures around the world, and he likes what he sees and smells.

Mexican, Thai, Polish, Egyptian, Caribbean - the list goes on and on, and the Vancouver mayor wants such eclectic choices in his city, where measly street menu boast little more than hot dogs and sausages.

In an interview this week, he said a more vibrant cart culture will start to come to Canada's Olympic city later this year.

"Cities like Portland are way ahead for us on this, so we're looking hard at how to catch up and make sure we have great food offerings on our streets," said Mr. Robertson, whose résumé includes developing his own line of food products, the Happy Planet line of organic juices and smoothies. The Oregon city, he added, "has made it possible for a lot of different types of food to be available on the street, and let the market determine what happens, and I think they're seeing good success from that."

In fact, Portland's food-cart bounty features more than 450 carts, and consumers line up for meals that produce change from a $10 bill.

Waiting for a $5 chicken bowl dish from a Korean barbeque cart, local musician Mary Rowell said: "I love Polish, Thai. I love the Bosnian. I love the Greek dude," she added, waving at some of the vendors in a downtown lot, busy with the lunch crowd. "I love food carts because you get a variety and it's cheap." The violinist said she is always on a budget and can get two meals out of one serving from any cart. "One place I go, I say, 'I've got $3. What can I get?' They give me $3 of food."

Mr. Robertson wants something similar in Vancouver, adjusted to the realities of the B.C. city. In a Canadian context, Vancouver would be following Toronto, which is also struggling to develop a more diverse street-food scene.

"We don't have the same kind of space that many North American cities have," Mr. Robertson said. "We're closer to a European model, where space is limited, and that's a consideration for how we increase the offerings, but I think there are all sorts of possibilities at different scales and using different cart technologies, if you will. We're going to have lots of options to choose from, but it will be a unique-to-Vancouver option."

Vancouver and Portland have about the same population, at around 580,000. Compared to Portland's 450-plus carts, there are 40 street locations for food carts in Vancouver, according to Angelo Kouris, health protection manager for Vancouver Coastal Health, which monitors street-food quality. "The idea has been you want low-risk food items with minimal handling onsite," he said.

Staffers at City Hall are reassessing the issue. There's a meeting next week, with Vancouver Coastal Health at the table. Mr. Kouris said discussions may include welcoming trailers, kiosks and mobile kitchens to Vancouver, with either one form pre-eminent or some mix of all. Prior to summer, the mayor would like a report on options before council.

"Then it's a question of how quickly we can implement and get licenses issued and permits in place," he said. "I'm hopeful we see it later this year, that we're able to start implementing new offerings this year. That's the goal."

Alma Flores, an economic planner for the Portland Bureau of Planning and Development, said it's about time for a change in Vancouver's street-food scene. The occasional visitor to Vancouver said it could use a bit of Portland's food-cart variety, especially in its downtown core.

"Definitely your downtown is a bit on the dry side and could use a little street vitality," she said.

Ms. Flores said she spent an hour a few months ago briefing Wendy Mendes, a food-security consultant for Vancouver, on what Portland was doing. (Ms. Mendes did not return calls from The Globe.) "Her questions were about how we do it here," said Ms. Flores. "You shouldn't over-regulate. Ours is regulated, but not to the extent that we deter people from doing it."

Food carts in Portland largely seem to be small trailers that are planted in certain spots, but on wheels so they can be easily moved. Some carts offer food prepared elsewhere and served wrapped; others serve food largely cooked in kitchens elsewhere and assembled on scene, and some are virtual restaurants with full kitchens that can prepare beef, poultry or other meats.

Carts pay a business licence of $100 a year to the city, and also pay monthly rents to operators of the vacant or parking lots in which they plant themselves.

Jon Kowaguchi, environmental health supervisor with Multnomah County Environmental Health, serving Portland, said carts are inspected twice a year in random checks. (Inspections occur once a year in Vancouver.) Violation rates, he said, were less for carts than restaurants by about 18 per cent between January and October of last year.

Questions about the origins of the Portland cart boom generate varied answers, depending on whom you ask. Ms. Flores said the carts began to be entrenched about eight years ago. However, there has been a particular acceleration in the last 18 months, and a 40-per-cent increase in the number of carts since 2008.

No particular municipal policy pushed the cart scene, she said - growth has just happened. "The city hasn't done anything other than not hinder it," she said. There are no statistics, she said, on the economic impact of the carts.

In her view, the carts have been a reaction to high unemployment, and the daunting costs of trying to open a regular restaurant. It's cheaper, and more possible to test a food idea, with a cart than a restaurant, she said.

"It's part of microenterprise development, which you always want for your city," she said.

That theme resonates with Mr. Robertson, who developed Happy Planet in a spirit akin to the Portland entrepreneurs spinning dishes from their native countries.

"It's a great economic opportunity for entrepreneurs," he said. "We're known globally as a great food city, thanks to our restaurants. It would be fantastic to see that same reputation extend into our streets and create opportunities for food entrepreneurs, because there are lots of people who can establish a small-scale business with street food that will never do that in the restaurant industry, which is another scale of capital and competition."

The restaurant sector in Portland has raised some objections to competition from food carts, and some of their Vancouver counterparts signalled their concerns this week.

Neil Wyles, owner of the Hamilton Street Grill in Yaletown, said he stands by an online comment a few months ago: He said he would be upset to have a street vendor outside his business because the vendor does not have to pay property taxes or business-improvement levies, or for garbage removal.

"If there was to be an expansion of street vending - and I do agree that we should have something other than hot dogs - then they should be placed in an area where they do not harm any brick-and-mortar type business like near the seawall or near the beaches," he said.

This week, he acknowledged that Vancouver "is, quite frankly, very boring" in its street food. "All you get is Mr. Tube Steak," he said.

Mr. Robertson, asked about his own street-food tastes, said he has tried a veggie dog. "I'll look forward to more variety," he said, "and I hear that from lots of people, too, on the street, that there's a lot of appetite for this."

Food facts:

Findings on food carts from "Food Cartology, Rethinking Urban Spaces as People Places," a 2008 study by the City of Portland Bureau of Planning and the Urban Vitality Group

1. Food carts have positive impacts on street vitality and neighbourhood life in lower density residential areas as well as in high-density downtowns.

2. When a cluster of carts is located on a private site, the heightened intensity of the use can negatively impact the surrounding community, primarily from the lack of trash cans.

3. A cart's exterior appearance does not affect social interactions or the public's overall opinion of the carts; seating availability is more important for promoting social interaction than the appearance of the cart's exterior.

4. The presence of food carts on a site does not appear to hinder its development.

5. Food carts represent beneficial employment opportunities because they provide an improved quality of life and promote social interactions between owners and customers.

6. Despite the beneficial opportunities that food carts can provide, there are numerous challenges to owning a food cart.

7. While many food cart owners want to open storefront businesses, there is a considerable financial leap from a food cart operation to opening a storefront.

8. Food cart owners do not frequently access small business development resources available to them, such as bank loans and other forms of assistance.