Those Box-Style Vendor Things

[VicMan]

In Center City Philadelphia I saw these metal box-like things where a garage-style door is rolled up and a vendor is selling things like newspapers, food, drinks, and memorabilia.

Does Downtown Houston have any of these? If so, does Downtown need them?

[midtown_resident]

I wouldn't mind seeing something like that on Main...though I'm not sure how they'd stand the heat. There are plenty of vendors in the entrances of most office buildings and at tunnel level as well.

[VicMan]

Is it possible for those things to work with window AC units?

[RedScare]

Sure they could. Just like the portable food stands sometimes have. Houston is kind of picky about renting out its sidewalk space. If you can lease a couple of parking spaces on a surface lot, though, you could put these stalls in.

I like the thought. I wonder how popular newspapers are these days, though. Other vendors could do this as well.

[KimberlySayWhat]

Ethan Hawk's character in "Reality Bites" works at one of those in downtown Houston.

[ssullivan]

I recently heard a report on NPR concerning those sidewalk newsstands in New York, which has traditionally been full of them. Many have failed in the last 10 years, and there's now only a fraction of the number there once was. Seems the Internet and easy access to media and information 24/7 has hurt a lot of their business.

I think they're pretty neat, and love being able to find one in Manhattan when I want a bottle of water or a light snack. I'm not sure how they'd work in Houston though, as so much of our pedestrian traffic downtown uses the tunnels.

[MidtownCoog]

They have these on the rail lines in Amsterdam.

[editor]

Chicago's mayor has done everything in his power to get rid of them. I think there are only ten or so left. Mayor Daley has a rat phobia, and as part of his campaig against rats, he's run most of these out of business. He also got rid of the hotdog carts for the same reason. Since he came into office, there are a slew of new laws designed to cut down on the rat population.

[Heights2Bastrop]

There used to be a wonderful newsstand on Texas across from the Rice Hotel that was open to the street. Next to it was the KC Restaurant (CK Restaurant?) that had tables designed to eat while standing.

[The Great Hizzy!]

I'll accept a trade: the box vendor newstands for those small newspaper stands located at almost every corner. I'm convinced most of the litter downtown comes from these stands, either from people accidentally leaving them open or from the homeless raiding them so that they can make bed linings and so forth. I know several months ago, I saw one homeless guy go inside one of the free newstands and pull out an entire stack of them, keeping half but sitting the other half on the ground, where I'm sure the wind had an easy time blowing them all over the place.