Chapter 6.1
Community Health and Safety

• ALL
• Remove Code Barriers
• Create Incentives
• Fill Regulatory Gaps

Permit the Display and Sale of Fruits and Vegetables on Public Sidewalks

INTRODUCTION

Healthy food retailers are an essential component of healthy, thriving communities.[1] In particular, a “diet rich in vegetables and fruits can lower blood pressure, reduce the risk of heart disease and stroke, prevent some types of cancer, lower risk of eye and digestive problems, and have a positive effect upon blood sugar.”[2] However, a lack of access to healthy food can result in or contribute to food deserts – an urban environment where local residents living more than one mile from a supermarket lack immediate access to foods essential for a healthy, nutritious diet.[3] The U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates that 23.5 million Americans live in a food desert.[4] As a consequence, many individuals do not have access to enough fresh produce.[5] In particular, low-income neighborhoods, communities of color, and rural areas continue to struggle with food insecurity throughout the United States.[6] Many Americans also live in food swamps, where an overabundance of high calorie food “swamps out” healthy food options.[7] Food swamps are linked to increased rates of obesity and diabetes.[8] In conjunction with food deserts, food swamps have a similarly disparate impact on low-income neighborhoods and communities of color, resulting in higher rates of obesity and diabetes in minority populations, especially those lacking financial resources, educational resources, and access to health care.[9] Thus, while numerous factors impact the health and welfare of a given community, access to fresh produce and other healthy foods plays a pivotal role.

Permitting established storefronts to display and sell fruits and vegetables on public sidewalks can stimulate purchases of high quality produce by community members. Research shows that impulse buying occurs at a high rate in the produce department.[10] While the freshness, quality, and prices of fruits and vegetables play an important role in influencing purchase decisions, “it’s the appearance of produce that influences their purchase.”[11] Furthermore, physical factors such as consumers’ ease of access to nearby outdoor vending stalls significantly motivate shopping behavior. Thus, sidewalk vendors of fresh produce can utilize the physical convenience of sidewalk sales in combination with appealing displays to encourage healthy food impulse buying by community members. By permitting sidewalk fruit and vegetable displays, local governments, especially in communities struggling with dietary health, can positively influence and encourage community members to purchase and consume more fresh produce.[12]

Ordinances permitting sidewalk fruit and vegetable displays provide additional community benefits beyond encouraging the purchase and consumption of healthy foods. Other benefits including promoting walkability and street life, improving entrepreneurship, improving intercommunal social connections, and incentivizing the vending of healthy food more generally.[13] In an effort to achieve these benefits while mitigating potential harms, specific regulations and limitations often supplement provisions in ordinances permitting sidewalk food vendors. For instance, local governments can address concerns over sanitation through restrictions limiting the length of time vendors can display food as well as requiring compliance with pre-existing food service health and safety standards.[14] This method reduces the displayed food’s exposure to outdoor contaminants as well as incorporates long-standing and proven health and safety requirements. Additionally, codes can also include provisions requiring the indoor storage of food when not on display.[15] Furthermore, local governments can stipulate minimum height requirements for food displays in order to avoid ground-based food contamination.[16]

In an effort to mitigate the potential burden of food displays on pedestrians, local governments have at least two options: First, local governments can include more general provisions regulating the location of vendor displays.[17] Such provisions help ensure the safety and free movement of pedestrians and vehicles and also ensure that emergency vehicles and first responders have necessary access to equipment and resources.[18] Second, local governments can include provisions regulating the physical nature and operation of the displays by specifying size requirements, limiting noise output, and regulating the removal of trash and equipment.[19]

EFFECTS

Allowing the display of fruits and vegetables on frequently used public sidewalks can be beneficial to local shoppers and the community at large, local businesses, and local farmers. When food displays on public sidewalks are adjacent to stores, restaurants, and other local businesses, they can help increase customer traffic to those businesses.[20] The display of fresh, attractive produce can improve consumer impressions of adjacent businesses.[21] Furthermore, such displays can also encourage shopping.[22] In providing fresh produce options via sidewalk displays, retailers can partner with local farms, giving local farmers an additional and ongoing opportunity to sell their produce.[23]

Ordinances allowing the display of fruits and vegetables can also benefit the community at large by increasing awareness of and access to healthy foods. (For other ways to increase awareness of and access to fruits and vegetables see our briefs Community Gardens on Private Property as a By Right or Permitted Use, Farmers Markets in a Variety of Districts, Temporary Farm Stands, and Grocery Store Development in Recognized Food Deserts). Ordinances that contribute to increasing individuals’ consumption of fruits and vegetables can have numerous health benefits including reducing the risks of heart diseases, obesity, type 2 diabetes and some types of cancer.[24] Such ordinances, especially when implemented in commercial districts with high pedestrian traffic, can help combat the trend of decreasing access to healthy foods, a growing problem resulting in food deserts across the United States.[25] In addition to having access to fresh produce, public awareness of that access plays a key role in the advancement of public health. In communities with lower incomes, individuals perceiving the places they shop as conveniently offering a wide selection of quality produce are more likely to eat at least three servings of fruits and vegetables daily.[26] By increasing the availability of fruits and vegetables through the permitted use of sidewalk displays, local governments may aid in improving the dietary health of community members.[27]

EXAMPLES

Passaic, NJ

Passaic, New Jersey, a city of approximately 70,000,[28] allows retail food establishments to sell products during the day on sidewalks for “the convenience of the establishment patrons.”[29] One example of a retail food establishment is a produce stand selling fresh fruits and vegetables.[30] In order to avoid the encroachment of burdensome equipment, establishments seeking to sell food products on sidewalks must first apply for and obtain a permit.[31] Additionally, applicants must submit a plan for maintaining the cleanliness of the area.[32]

Passaic’s Code also sets out a number of stipulations regulating the nature and location of food displays. The City requires that the equipment complement the architecture of the surrounding area.[33] In an effort to preserve pedestrian mobility and safety, Passaic also requires that establishments maintain at least a five-foot space between the equipment and the adjacent curb.[34] Passaic’s Code additionally addresses the issue of noise through the prohibition of outdoor music or amplifying systems and a general requirement that the “peace and quiet” of the area not be disturbed.[35] Upon meeting all of these conditions, the City allows establishments to sell food products on the sidewalk between the hours of 7:00 a.m. and 10:00 p.m. Passaic further requires that establishments remove the equipment from sidewalks by 10:30 p.m.[36]

To view the provision see Passaic, NJ, Code of Ordinances § 245 (2012).

Springfield, MO

In an effort to prevent pedestrian obstacles, the city of Springfield, Missouri, normally restricts the display of public merchandise on any public area including streets and sidewalks.[37] However, the City makes an exception for the display of fruits and vegetables.[38] To address issues of sanitation and pedestrian obstacles, the City provides specific guidelines for how establishments may display fruits and vegetables.[39] Concerning potential sanitation issues, Springfield’s code requires establishments to display food at least 15 inches above the ground.[40] To avoid displays becoming burdensome obstacles, the City only permits establishments to display food directly in front of the premises where the fruits and vegetables are sold.[41] Additionally, the displays must not intrude more than two feet into the sidewalk.[42]

To view the provision see Springfield, MO, Code of Ordinances § 98-5 (1981).

Minneapolis, MN

A larger city of over 400,000 residents,[43] Minneapolis normally restricts selling and displaying food products on streets and sidewalks, but has made an exception for “raw fruits and vegetables that are intended for hulling, peeling, or washing by the consumer before consumption.”[44] While the selling of these types of foods is permitted, establishments holding sidewalk sales must comply with the City’s regulations.[45] The first of these regulations concerns the placement of displays.[46] Displays must be placed on the side of the sidewalk where the affiliated business is located.[47] Furthermore, displays must not protrude into the sidewalk more than thirty inches and must leave at least sixty inches of straight pedestrian walkway unobstructed.[48] The City also regulates when businesses may have displays, permitting them only between 8:00 a.m. and 10:00 p.m. and requiring their removal from the sidewalk outside of these hours.[49] Finally, Minneapolis’s code ensures that pedestrians will have necessary space. In addition to the 60 inch requirement, displays may not block any building entrances or be located near an intersection where a driver’s view could be obstructed.[50] The display may also not have any objects extend into the remaining empty space required for pedestrian traffic.[51]

To view the provisions see Minneapolis, MN Code of Ordinances § 188.110 (2017), Minneapolis, MN Code of Ordinances § 427.130 (2014).

ADDITIONAL EXAMPLES

South Daytona, FL, Land Development Code § 5.6(A)(3)(d)(1) (2018) (allowing for the sale of fruits and vegetables as the sole exemption to the requirement that sidewalk sales be of a temporary, promotional nature).

Philadelphia, PA, The Philadelphia Code § 9-204 (2016) (allowing sidewalk vendors in the “Center City” zone and exempting fruit and vegetable displays from certain regulations).

New York City, NY, The Rules of the City of New York § 6-07 (2020) (requiring the permanent affixing of identification decals on “Green Carts”—permit-holding sidewalk vendors of uncut fruits and vegetables—to control and monitor the strategic distribution of healthy food vendors in the city’s food deserts).

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

National Policy & Legal Analysis Network to Prevent Childhood Obesity (NPLAN), Model Produce Cart Ordinance: Increasing Access to Fresh Produce by Creating a Permit Program for Sidewalk Produce Vendors, ChangeLab Solutions (2013) (providing a model ordinance with supplemental explanations to aid local governments in creating cost-effective and efficient produce cart programs to increase residents’ access to healthy produce).