Vancouver has been experimenting with allowing a greater variety of food carts recently. The previous regulations allowed nothing more exotic than a hotdog cart

Vancouver has been experimenting with allowing a greater variety of food carts recently. The previous regulations allowed nothing more exotic than a hotdog cart, which led to innovations like Japadog. In the first instance they've picked 17 sites with the explicit purpose of avoiding the kind of conflict described in the article - so they tend to be in front of office buildings etc. The process of handing out licenses for these sites by lottery initially produced some odd results but this seems to be sorting itself out in the wash - and we're starting to see some success stories. It'll be interesting to see how the scheme can be expanded while still avoiding conflict - I think we may have a case of Portland-envy and won't stop until we can say Vancouver's scene is as vibrant as Portland's. The whole area of BIAs and how well they represent the interests of local businesses is somewhat interesting to me right now, as it appears that BIAs are a primary force in opposing any kind of change in the city especially those that affect parking and car usage. Like, for example, better bike lanes.