207th DTES Street Market and 21th Street Market of 2014

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207th DTES Street Market and 21th Street Market of 2014

May 27, 2014 ahamedia Leave a comment Go to comments

207th DTES Street Market and 21th Street Market of 2014

Roland Clarke, Coordinator of the DTES Street Market says:

It was a great spring day despite the rain.

The rain started as a mere tinkle, then progressed to a downpour later in the afternoon.

We deployed all of our 10×10 canopy tents, and this helped the vendors survive the deluge. We had over 130 vendors despite the rain.

There were a number of good interactions with the police today. At least two vendors were escorted out of the market after selling questionable items. We made a point of thanking them, because these vendors were warned by volunteers earlier that their stuff was not allowed at the market. One vendor was selling clearly tagged items, and another had a bike that was quite suspect. Our volunteers reasonably can not lay a hand on a vendor, so asking them to leave is the limit of our powers. We welcome the help from the VPD to allow us to create an orderly, safe, and family friendly market.

Jacek constructed a number of new carts out of spare parts – using the HXBIA tool share tools – and they are working great. We were able to lower the weight per cart, and now have three table carts, instead of piling them on two.

Our constantly evolving operation keeps improving and allowing us to build a better market to serve the vendors of the DTES.

In many ways, we believe that we are turning a corner.

With a small boost in operational support for things like private security, improved perimeter fencing, and a proper vendor ID tag system, we know that we can eliminate much of the negative stereotype for our market, and create the tourist attraction that the DTES desperately needs.