MEDIA

WOSU Radio: All Sides with Ann Fisher, May 2013
Ethnic Food Trucks (with Robert Lemon)

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The Truck Food Cookbook by John T. Edge, page 218

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Columbus Dispatch January 10th, 2012
Architect-designer couple see food trucks drawing diners to struggling areas (Meals as Magnets)

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Serious Eats – December 2011
5 Incredible Tacos in Columbus Ohio

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WCBE Foodcast September 24th, 2011
Best Taco Trucks of 2011

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WCBE Foodcast September 17th, 2011
History of the Taco Trucks Columbus Website

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Maxim Magazine – Los Guachos 2011
Five Best Dinners

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NPR Talk of the Nation October 13th, 2010
Food Trucks Taking Sidewalks By Storm

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Top Ten Food Carts (Columbus Underground, September 2010)
Top Ten Food Carts (with several taco Trucks)

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Columbus Alive People to Watch 2010 – Hungry Woolf and Taco Trucks Columbus Amiga – Bethia
Columbus Alive – People to Watch – Bethia Woolf

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Mike Beaumont – Taco Truck Tour Video – August 2010
Columbus Food Adventures Taco Truck Tour on You Tube (You will see the three amigos in this video, two amigos own the Columbus Food Adventures)

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John Schumacher Blog – July 2010
Columbus Food Adventures (inc. some Taco Trucks Columbus history too

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WOSU Radio – May 2010
Mexican Food On Wheels: Columbus’ Taco Trucks

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Alive – April 29th, 2010
Taco Truck Tour: Spicy Bites on the Streets of Columbus

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Slow Food Columbus Blog, April 2010
Taco Nazo caters Rick Bayless event at North Market

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Columbus Monthly, July 2009

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FRONTERAS – (The Columbus Dispatch): July 9th, 2009, page 4

(This site is in Spanish/Espanol. You will need to select Jueves, 09 Julio, 2009 – not for the technologically non agile)

click to see larger

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The Dispatch Kitchen / 10 TV Taco Trucks Segment: June 24th, 2009

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Tracking Tacos – The Columbus Dispatch: June 24th, 2009

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Columbus Foodcast – Episode 43 – Taco Trucking: June 2009

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Article from Columbus Alive!: April 23rd, 2009

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Columbus Alive!: April 9th 2009

The link above is about the TacoTrucksColumbus.com site.

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Taquerias – Blog from 2007 tracking the culture and foodways of the Taco Trucks in Columbus at that time

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Food Wagons an Acquired Taste
Mobile stands bother some neighborhoods; city considers regulations

By Mark Ferenchik in THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH December 6, 2007

The mobile food wagons popping up in parking lots all over town have created enough of a stir among neighborhood leaders that a Columbus official said the city will discuss regulating them more. Hilltop leaders have been at the forefront in pushing for stricter rules. The food carts, most of them Latino-owned and featuring items such as tacos and quesadillas, have dotted their neighborhood and others in the city now for several years.

The food wagons are an example of the cultural change sweeping through Columbus neighborhoods: Newcomers bring businesses they knew back home, while residents of a city still relatively inexperienced with large numbers of immigrants wonder how to deal with them. Dave Horn, the Greater Hilltop Area Commission’s zoning chairman, said some think they create a “ragtag image” for the neighborhood. Some residents and business owners have complained that customers litter parking lots.

In Mexico, the wagons are common, said Julia Arbini Carbonell, president of the Ohio Hispanic Coalition. She thinks the neighborhood is unfairly targeting Mexican vendors. “The Hilltop is reacting to something not usual to them,” said Carbonell, who owns an office building at Sullivant Avenue and Wilson Road. “It doesn’t mean it has no quality and it is no good,” she said. “Accept that people have different values and traditions.”

But Horn said standards are necessary. “If residents think it’s affecting the image of the neighborhood,” he said, “we should talk about it with everyone around the table, figuring what the standard should be.”

Chris Presutti, Columbus’ chief zoning official, agrees. He wants to meet with neighborhood leaders and city officials to discuss what the city can do to better regulate the wagons since the city’s code doesn’t specifically address them. “I think what’s on the books should be clarified, so you don’t have to go through five chapters of zoning code to see how to regulate food carts,” Presutti said. Presutti wrote a policy memo in August outlining standards for mobile vending wagons. The memo says they are allowed in “nonresidential” districts but cannot occupy required parking spaces or obstruct driveways, or be stored on-site. Dana Rose, code-enforcement manager, said the city has cited food wagons for violating those standards.

Carbonell said she wants a seat at any discussion. Although there are fewer food wagons out now as winter approaches, more will set up in commercial areas once the weather gets better again. “They’re difficult to regulate,” Presutti said. “They come and go.” The operators must have a peddler’s license from the city and a license from the health department. It’s difficult to determine how many peddler’s licenses have been issued to food-wagon operators, said Sharon Gadd, manager of the city’s license section. But she said 719 peddler’s licenses have been issued this year, down from 851 last year and 822 in 2005.

Columbus Public Health spokesman Jose Rodriguez said he’s not aware of any specific health concerns about food wagons. The city has issued 352 licenses for mobile food operations, including push carts. It has received only 12 complaints this year about those vendors, he said.

Northland Community Council President Dave Paul, who has seen the wagons set up in parking lots along Rt. 161, said no one’s targeting ethnic groups. “If someone was selling gyros out of a truck, I’d be just as concerned,” he said.

“Some people think it’s fabulous free enterprise,” said the Hilltop’s Horn. “Other people think it’s a scourge.”

Vernon Godsey thinks they’re great. “I’m all for free enterprise,” said the 37-year-old roofer as he wolfed down four tacos Tuesday at a yellow food wagon on Georgesville Road just north of Sullivant Avenue. “For us, it’s fast,” Godsey said. He and his crew get to return to work quickly.

The owner, Pudente Reyes, 30, said he works from 8 a.m. to 11 p.m. every day except Monday. He’s set up shop at the same location for three years, just outside Columbus in Franklin Township. Reyes said more vendors will move to the townships if Columbus regulates them.

Chuck Parker of the Northland Community Council said he worked with the city to move one cart from his Devonshire neighborhood along Rt. 161 just east of I-71. The cart moved but just farther east, he said. “Nobody wants them in our neighborhood,” Parker said.

THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH Copyright (c) 2007 The Dispatch Printing Co.

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From the Columbus Dispatch, January 1st, 2005