re: Why Are Food Trucks Not Allowed In New Orleans?

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Surprised you left, surely industry exists in NOLA equal to Houston?

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Not sure what you're asking here? I work in finance/energy. I'm trying to move home as hard as possible, its proving to be extremely difficult, which sucks the big one.

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Houston has such a large amount of industry that require a large amounts of supply of food. This exists with or without food trucks. Obviously New Orleans is a much smaller town,(New Orleans has 1/6 the population) with limited industry. The CBD is a work in progress, the city is constantly trying to attract business to town.

The universe of options is much smaller so when 1 restaurant in NOLA is lost it has a much larger impact then 1 lost in Houston.

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NOLA is also 350 square miles to Houston's 600. The macro view isn't important in my opinion, you need to look at it on the neighborhood-level in Houston to see how it works. My buddy that lives in Cypress isn't driving 45 miles to get a taco, but I've got no problem driving 3 miles from Uptown to Midcity to try out Toup's or whatever.

And I don't understand why 1 food truck has to come at the expense of a restaurant each time. We've been opening restaurants left and right for 5 years, the metro population is growing at a rate higher than the national average; this is clearly not a zero sum game. My point was that some pretty well regarded restaurants in Houston started out as food trucks, and at least in one case provided enough additional capital to start an entirely new business. Yeah, more competition will probably drive a few places to close, as it should. Another city is showing it can also lead to new jobs and new brick and mortars. People want economic growth but they don't want the risk that comes with it. It doesn't have to be an all or nothing proposition, but the nothing proposition is certainly not the answer.