Round Rock, TX Food Trucks & Mobile Vendors: Vending Zones (2026)

Round Rock does not let a food truck park wherever it holds a license. A mobile food establishment (MFE) is a motor vehicle or enclosed trailer with walls and a roof in which a certified food handler cooks, prepares or assembles food for sale to the public. The city states that MFEs are not permitted everywhere and that not every type of business can host one. The approval belongs to the site, not the truck: the owner or manager of the host site applies for an MFE Zoning Review approval through the City of Round Rock Permit Portal, and it is issued only when the site suits MFEs as an accessory use. Vacant sites are not eligible, and approvals are never issued for undeveloped lots.

Sec. 2-93 sets up four approval types. A short-term review lets a site host MFEs for up to three days per permit, with no more than four permits issued per calendar year, for a $25 fee. A long-term review covers a calendar year for $150, and outside downtown the trucks can remain overnight only on weekends. An MFE Park permit lets a site host three or more MFEs in a designated, reviewed area for a calendar year at $150; those trucks can stay overnight and serve customers even when the site's primary use is closed. Downtown has its own short-term ($25) and long-term ($150) tracks.

Eligible hosts depend on the track. Outside downtown, short-term hosts include commercially zoned or employment and industrial-zoned property with an operational business, event centers, community and government service facilities, places of worship, municipal parks, HOA common areas, and small-scale alcohol production facilities. Long-term hosts outside downtown are narrower: multi-tenant centers where the truck sits in an internally oriented pedestrian promenade not visible from the public right-of-way, alcohol production facilities, event centers, municipal parks, HOA common areas, and schools, corporate campuses and business parks serving their own students or employees. MFE Parks are limited to education facilities, corporate office campuses, business and industrial parks, and municipal parks.

Downtown trucks must sit on private property or, with approval, in unimproved alleys, with extra screening and separation near single-family homes. One MFE is allowed per site, except at MU-2 event centers. On MU-L lots fronting Main St and Georgetown St, only limited mobile food services are allowed: no exhaust fans, grills, deep fryers, ranges or griddles, only food warming, packaging of pre-prepared food and beverage preparation.