Charlottesville, VA Food Trucks & Mobile Vendors: Sidewalk & Mobile Vending (2026)

Article V of Chapter 28, 'Vending from Vehicles in Streets,' defines vending under § 28-151 as the sale of food, drink, ice cream or other frozen dessert to a retail customer within the right-of-way of any public street in the city, and covers every motor vehicle used to transact that business. Farm produce grown by the vendor and vendors selling wood are exempted under § 28-153.

Section 28-155 bars any sale from a vending vehicle on a street posted above 25 miles per hour, and § 28-156 forbids leaving an unattended vending vehicle parked on a city street between 2:00 a.m. and 7:00 a.m. Section 28-157 keeps trucks at least 100 feet from school property unless the principal has given annual written consent to stop closer. When making a sale under § 28-158, the vehicle must pull to the right-hand curb in a legal space, or the extreme right edge of pavement where there's no curb, the motor must be off unless running it is essential to producing the product sold, and no sale may be made to anyone who isn't standing on the sidewalk or, absent a sidewalk, off the paved roadway. That same section bans vending in residential zones between 8:00 p.m. and 7:00 a.m. during Daylight Saving Time, or 6:00 p.m. to 7:00 a.m. on Standard Time, and bans parking or selling in front of an operating restaurant on the same side of the street during its business hours.

Sections 28-161 and 28-162 add operational duties: noise-making devices to attract customers are barred except bells sounded only while the truck is moving between stops, and each vehicle must carry a trash receptacle and leave no wrappers, papers, or containers behind on the sidewalk or street.