Food trucks could help Manteca pump new life into downtown.

That’s a possibility Councilman Gary Singh sees with a move to revamp city ordinances to make Manteca more food truck friendly.

From Singh’s perspective he wants to see two things accomplished — a clear municipal policy that restricts how close food trucks can park to brick and mortar restaurants and restricting them on a day-to-day basis to parking within industrial zones with the exception of Library Park.

Singh wants to avoid what has happened in some other cities where food trucks have parked on city streets directly in front of restaurants or on adjoining property to essentially piggyback off the investments of restaurants.

“Food trucks really should be in industrial zones,” Singh noted.

Singh was the first elected Manteca official to push the need to rework the food truck ordinance that now restricts them to 10-minute stays in one location except for special events. There was council consensus in December to have staff come up with proposed changes.  The tentative changes have been circulated to the Manteca Chamber of Commerce — the organization that represents the most businesses in the city — for input.

Singh said he is driven by a desire to recreate the buzz that Food Truck Mania created at Woodward Park in 2016. The first event on a Sunday drew 16 food truck and a crowd in excess of 6,000 over a five hour period.

Singh believes Library Park would be an ideal place to allow food trucks to park on a regular basis.

“It will help bring more dining options and more people downtown,” Singh said

He noted Library Park already has city restrooms. It also has picnic tables, lots of shade and grass as well as playground equipment.

Increasing positive community use of Library Park has been an objective of the city for years.

Where the rubber

hits the rubber on

Manteca streets

Some of the streets in Manteca that are wearing the best were resurfaced in 2008 with an overlay of asphalt mixed with ground up used tires.

“They’re doing well,” Public Works Director Mark Houghton said of the streets have the tire rubber mixture. “It cost a little more but it holds up better and lasts longer.”

The extra cost for the mixed overlay was covered by a $50,000 grant from the California Integrated Solid Waste Management Board.

Included among the street sections that have recycled rubber tires in the asphalt are Alameda Street from Fremont Street to Main Street, Cottage Avenue from Yosemite Avenue to the Highway 99 overpass, Moffat Boulevard south of Spreckels Avenue, East Yosemite Avenue between Commerce Avenue and Spreckels Avenue, Industrial Park Drive from Main Street to a point just east of Bessemer Avenue, and Center Street from Union Road to the railroad tracks.

Those streets are a bit softer. If you doubt that jog down any of the aforementioned streets and then jog down a street with a standard asphalt overlay.

Research and data collected by various state transportation agencies show the rubberized asphalt pavement:

*reduces traffic noise by an average of four decibels although in some cases a noise reduction as much as 90 percent or 10 decibels has been attained.

*provides a smoother and quieter ride.

*is more durable and skid-resistant than conventional asphalt.

*does not reflect cracks from the existing pavement.

*has an estimated life span of 18 years with many cases of pavement now 14 years old not needing any maintenance whatsoever.

Some cities in Arizona report feedback from joggers who have noticed the asphalt is somewhat softer - and therefore less jarring - than regular pavement.

About 1,500 used tires are recycled to asphalt ever lane-mile of rubberized pavement.

That addresses a major environmental problem for California as tires cannot be placed in landfills.

As a result there are huge stockpiles of tires at various locations in California.

One such location was at S.F. Royster’s Tire Disposal south of Tracy on McArthur Drive near Linne Road where over 7 million illegally stored tires caught on fire on Aug. 7, 1998. It was allowed to burn for more than two years before it was extinguished in a bid to avoid groundwater contamination. Groundwater was contaminated anyway with the cleanup cost pegged at $16.2 million.

Rubber is extracted from used tires by separating the casings, fabric, and steel. The extracted rubber is then ground to the consistency of ground coffee.

To contact Dennis Wyatt, email dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com