Following the closure of the Wednesday afternoon Upper Haight Farmers Market in August, the Recreation and Parks Department is proposing to “activate” the asphalt area at Waller and Stanyan by adding a second evening of food trucks.
Off the Grid has been bringing food trucks to the site on Thursday evenings since 2010. RPD has now floated the idea of “adding an additional Tuesday night market” which “will likely provide the healthy community engagement that the Department and the surrounding community and merchants desire.”
There has been a mixed response from merchants on Haight Street. Unsurprisingly, owners of brick-and-mortar restaurants are generally not enthusiastic, seeing OTG as providing a large pool of competing vendors who don’t have to pay high commercial rents. But other business owners view the increased evening foot traffic as a benefit, or like having more food choices for themselves and their employees. Not mentioned in Rec and Park’s proposal is how this might link to a broader vision for the Alvord Lake area.