The National Post's Montreal's food truck vendors can now feed the masses – but only if bureaucrats deem them gourmet covers the tight control city officials are exerting over food trucks.  Key quote:

Bureaucrats are dictating where they can operate, when they must close, even what part of the truck they can serve from. City hall picked which trucks would be licensed based on their ability to “contribute to Montreal’s brand image as a gourmet city.” If you planned to serve hotdogs, they had better be hand-crafted and locally sourced. And your poutine should be topped with foie gras or wild mushrooms.

After 60 years of laws against street food of any kind, this spring Montreal decided to start a pilot project to evaluate food trucks. But due to heavy pressure from existing restaurants, the city is putting strict limitations on food truck numbers and operations.

  

We've posted in the past on the regulatory battles happening around food trucks.  Brick and mortar restaurants don't like the competition and are using their political power to try and fend off food trucks.

This is a common response to competition based on a new business models – examples include the U.S. auto industry versus Japanese automakers, traditional airlines versus low cost airlines, independent booksellers versus Amazon – the list goes on and on.

Our research indicates food trucks are here to stay – they simply offer too much customer value not to win in the long run.  But expect the regulatory battles to become more common and intense, and slow down the growth of food trucks.