A food cart is a mobile kitchen that is set up on the street to facilitate the sale and marketing of street food to people from the local pedestrian traffic. Food carts are often found in large cities throughout the world and can be found selling food of just about any variety.
Food carts come in two basic styles. One allows the vendor to sit or stand inside and serve food through a window. Another uses all of the room inside the cart for storage and to house the cooking machinery, usually some type of grilling surface. The cart style is determined principally by the type of food served at the cart.
Food carts are different from food trucks because they do not travel under their own power. Some food carts are towed by another vehicle, while some alternatively are pushed by a human.
The first food carts probably came into being at the time of the early Greek and Roman civilisations, with traders converting old hand-carts and smaller animal drawn carts into mobile trading units. Carts have the distinct advantage of being able to be moved should a location not be productive in sales, as well as transporting goods to/from storage to the place chosen from which to trade.
However, the use of carts exploded with the coming of the railways. Firstly, highly mobile customers required food and drink to keep them warm within the early open carriages. Secondly locomotives needed to stop regularly to take on coal and water, and hence allow their passengers use the toilets, eat and drink. Thirdly, few early trains had any form of buffet or dining car. Finally, when passengers did arrive at their destination, or at a point when they needed to switch trains or modes of transport, some refresehment was required, particularly for poorer passengers who could not afford to stay in the railway-owned hotels. This expansion lead to a mutually successful relationship, with some of the first concession stands and laws developing from mobile traders operating from restricted railway property. This form of concession based operation can be seen still in may countries, but at its most original in the under developed stations and infrastructure of Africa and South East Asia
The railways also brought another benefit: a plentiful supply of new suitably sized carts. Often traders requiring new carts would simply buy old railway station luggage carts and adapt them to serving food, knowing that these were sized/scaled to fit in between the necessary doors and lifts.
Today the size and scale of carts has generally increased, and most are towed behind 4x4 vehicles, with the biggest being based in the semi-trailers of heavy goods vehicles. But hand towed food carts are still a common site where access is restricted and hungry people can be found.
The structure of food carts have recently seen new changes like modular designed carts made with stainless steel, fiber reinforced plastic and aluminum. Some have been developed with the ability to be driven by itself.
Some food carts are associated with restaurants. Most of the food served from the cart is the same as the food in the restaurant.
In the United States, the city of Portland, Oregon has experienced a boom in the number of food carts, trailers and stands.
A 2001 report in The Oregonian stated Portland was home to 175 carts, with fierce competition for the four cart spaces available since 1987 in the South Park Blocks. A bidding war in February 2001 led for a combined price of $192,000 for the spaces. There was also a large cluster at Fifth and Stark street, and one food cart had been running since 1980. Currently it is estimated that there are about 450 carts citywide.
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