Within the last year food trucks in Downtown Bellevue have started to appear more regularly. The trucks have frequented locations such as the Barnes & Noble parking lot, Rudy’s Barbershop parking lot, and most recently the old KFC lot.
If you’ve been to downtown Portland before, you are familiar with the many street corners that are full of food trucks. Besides the volume of trucks that Portland has compared to Bellevue, the main difference is that these trucks are regularly parked in specific areas every day. You can count on these food trucks in Portland to be there day after day.
Currently in Bellevue they are inconsistent. The best way to keep up with their whereabouts is by following their Twitter feeds, signing up for emails, and serendipity. This is not effective. Companies with trucks have expressed that they would like to visit Bellevue more often, but the issues seems to be that there is a lack of space and getting the proper permission from the city is challenging.
Currently food trucks frequenting Bellevue are Buns on Wheels, Molly Moon’s Homemade Ice Cream, Tuscan Stone Wood Fired Pizza, and Skillet.
There are 2 great locations for food trucks that are currently being under utilized – and until larger construction projects take place, would be great to see taken advantage of and managed as food truck destinations:
1) Washington Square Parking Lot (106th Ave NE & NE 8th St) – This location provides great access for both workers and residents of Downtown Bellevue. The 2010 Farmers Market was hosted at this location on Saturdays, and the feedback about this location was very positive.
2) Old KFC Parking Lot – This lot is currently occupied by Tuscan Stone Wood Fired Pizza, but with several food trucks it would create a spot known for Bellevue food trucks and gain more foot traffic.
Bring on the food trucks!
Old Windermere parking lot would be great too
Do we need to start a petition or something?
The problem with most of the food trucks is that they usually have good food, but they’re horrendously overpriced (Skillet makes a pretty good burger, but not one I’m sure is worth the $13 they charge for it with fries.) About the only food truck in Bellevue I visit regularly is the Taqueria Guadalajara truck at the 76 station in Overlake, which not only has really good tacos and burritos, but also has decent prices too.
1. Make sure they pay their taxes. At least one well-known Seattle food truck was sued last year by the state for failing to pay sales taxes, and I doubt they’re the only one stretching their profits in that way.
2. Make sure they’re inspected for food safety regularly. King County Health Dept needs the resources to keep these trucks safe, since in many cases mobile restaurants present more challenges.
3. Figure out how you’re going to deal with the issue of trucks competing with (“stealing away business from”) existing nearby restaurants. If a bunch of coffee and dessert trucks in the Washington Sq parking lot were to kill off Top Pot and/or other nearby businesses, that wouldn’t really be much of a step forward.
Agreed. I think the KFC spot would be perfect for a number of trucks to setup shop. It also would likely be better to have multiple trucks in that location instead of one since it is not as close to office buildings it would be a good destination spot if it added variety.
How about a boatload of trucks in the old Safeway parking lot? That seems to be more central than the other places mentioned, and has the advantage of drawing foot traffic from the mall as well.
YES! We need more food trucks. Safeway lot= Kemper/Freeman monopoly. The last thing they want is Ma + Pa shops with non-uniform looking trucks parking in their “beautiful” Safeway lot (yuck)! I say we encourage trucks via recruitment for the food trucks that already exist. “Hey X,Y,Z Food Truck Company, we really want you in Bellevue.” START A PETITION 🙂
Summer is right around the corner guys…
Would LOVE to bring the taco truck currently at overlake to downtown.
The BEST taco I have ever had!
@Boris & @Jacob I thought about the Safeway lot, but didn’t list it for a few of reasons. 1) There is a lot of congestion near Lincoln & Bellevue Square, and this would only add to the situation. 2) They are using that lot for employees of either Bellevue Square or Lincoln Square currently. 3) I don’t think they would ever go for it.
@Michael – I understand that Kemper would probably not go for it, but it’s not being used for employee parking now (and hasn’t been for six weeks or so). I live in Bellevue Towers and have looked down on an immaculate vacant parking lot for the past month and a half and been thinking of what could be 😉
The lot was used for employee parking during the Christmas season and a while thereafter, but it’s totally unused and chained off now.
I own a store in Downtown Bellevue- Skin and Soul Tattoo and Piercing, in the same parking lot as Sports Authority(Main and Bell Wy) and we have had Street Treats and Parfait set up in front of our shop multiple times. Both vendors did great business-we would love to see more food trucks in Bellevue!!!!
Food truck lovers should check out Chateau Ste Michelle’s Memorial Day Stay-cation event on Sunday, May 29th. http://www.ste-michelle.com/events/wineryCalendarDetail/401.
How would you feel about a Vegan Food Truck in Bellevue??
@Chef Bernard: what kind of cuisine? 🙂
Would love to have food trucks visit our campus in East Bellevue.
Bellevue Technology Center (formerly QBE) 9 buildings on 46 acre campus. Lots of parking available of 24th street entrance (NE section of campus)