Coon Rapids, MN Food Trucks & Mobile Vendors: Vending Zones (2026)

Section 5-1513(1) of the Coon Rapids City Code restricts a fixed-location mobile food unit to zoning districts where retail sales are a permitted or special use. The same subsection carves out an exception: mobile food units may set up on privately owned property in the Residential Zoning District and in the Office, Commercial, Port, and Industrial Zoning Areas, but only with the property owner's written permission. The subsection also imposes a 150-foot buffer from the entrance, exit, or patio of an existing brick-and-mortar restaurant, unless that restaurant's owner authorizes the closer location.

Section 5-1513(4) through (6) requires a food truck's fixed site to sit on a paved surface, bars parking on the public street, and requires customer parking to also be on pavement and to follow all traffic and roadway rules if it spills onto an adjacent public road. Section 5-1513(7) and (8) protects fire lanes, access to neighboring businesses, and circulation within an existing parking lot, and bars using any landscaped area or bufferyard for parking or for storing or displaying merchandise. Section 5-1513(9) bars a fixed-location truck from reducing a shopping center's parking supply so much that other businesses' customers are pushed onto the street.

Section 5-1508(2) requires the City Clerk to confirm with the Community Development Director that a proposed fixed site matches the zoning code before a license issues, and no license can be granted for a location needing a special use permit until that permit is approved.