Do you like food trucks? The city wants to know

If you’ve ever lamented the scarcity of food trucks downtown, now’s your chance to gripe about it in a way that could actually make a difference. Until October 31, the city is asking the public to weigh in on the ongoing Toronto food truck saga by filling out an online survey. The findings will help inform a new draft bylaw that should be ready by March 2014. Among the issues up for debate: the current moratorium on downtown food truck licenses; the possible effect of curbside food trucks on traffic flow; and, perhaps most contested, whether to set a minimum distance between trucks and brick-and-mortar restaurants, some of whom are worried about mobile snack houses swooping in and poaching their customers. Scott Fraser, the owner of the Hogtown Smoke truck, pooh-poohed the latter point at a town hall meeting on Tuesday: “The reality is, nobody’s going to walk by my truck on the way to Mortons and say: ‘Damn, I’m not going for a steak. I’m going to have a pulled pork sandwich tonight.’”