Whether you’re after a coffee down at the beach or can’t say no to a Vietnamese Banh Mi, Council’s Mobile Food Vending trial will be giving 10 businesses the chance to sell their goods at selected Council-owned or managed sites across the Wollongong region.
The trial is in line with Council’s commitment to support businesses and recognises how many food operators are looking at alternative ways to run their operations. There are already a number of mobile food vending businesses in the city currently operating on private land. This trial will see mobile food vending businesses operating on Council-owned or managed land.
Starting this month, the 12-month trial will test 15 locations as potential sites for mobile food vending. The selected sites will have different parameters such as trading hours, depending on their location, and have been selected by Council as spaces that would benefit more community activity and different food options.
Each of the business participating in the trial successfully applied and were awarded a licence to participate.
Over the next couple of months, we’ll invite our community to visit the sites and share their feedback on the trial. We want to know what you think about the trial and the range of selected sites.
“This trial will work by seeing the 10 successful applicants, who were appointed through a robust tendering process, rotate between 15 locations,” Wollongong City Lord Mayor Councillor Gordon Bradbery AM said.
“It will be up to the independent operator to choose their hours of operation from within the time slots offered by Council meaning that not every location will have a mobile food vending truck selling food every day of the week and each business can determine whether they trade in the morning, lunch or evening.
”By taking this fluid approach, we hope that the successful businesses will be able to make the most of this opportunity.”
The feedback from our community on the trial will help inform the final version of the draft Mobile Food Vending Policy. A copy of the draft Policy is available on the Our Wollongong website
“The draft Mobile Food Vending Policy is an important document that takes into consideration key learnings from other local governments who have implemented similar policies before and seen success,” Cr Bradbery said.
“It also really considers the individual needs of Wollongong. We know that our community is keen to see more innovative opportunities for food trucks and other mobile food vending sites across the city. Our draft Policy is one of the ways we can continue to encourage and support new opportunities into the future.
“One of the big benefits is that the trial will give our community the opportunity to see different types of trucks or vans at different places – near where they live, work or play.
You can submit feedback on the draft Mobile Food Vending Council Policy and trial by visiting the Our Wollongong website.
At the same time, we’ve been working hard to investigate and support new opportunities for outdoor dining across Wollongong. With 30 businesses approved by Council for outdoor dining in the past six-months alone, Wollongong’s dining and entertainment culture is offering more and more options with each visit.
