A Scream for Ice Cream Truck to Move

By Barry Owens
MAY 2, 2006

For as long as Tribeca's lone ice cream man, John Vrouvakis, has been peddling soft-serve in the neighborhood, his mostly young customers have known where to find him—parked on Greenwich Street directly in front of the entrance to Washington Market Park.

		It was a prime spot for the vendor, who for seven years running had the permit from the city's Parks Department to station his truck there and serve the hundreds of parents, nannies and children who couldn't help but pass his way every spring and summer afternoon. An ice cream truck at the park entrance may seem harmless, even quaint. But for many parents, its presence—tinkling siren song and all—could prompt a before-dinner power struggle over Firecrackers, Screwballs and Giant King Cones.
To the relief of many, the Washington Market Park's board of directors persuaded the city's Parks Department, which has authority over concessions outside of park property, to deny the ice cream man his permit unless he moved down the block.

So it was, last month, that Vrouvakis' truck was parked about a block south at Greenwich and Reade Streets, where his new permit stipulates he must remain.
"The park board didn't want to hurt his business," said Nelle Fortenberry, the board president. "There was no way before, short of putting blinders on your kid, to get out of the park without seeing the ice cream truck. We just wanted to give parents a choice about whether they want to have the SpongeBob SquarePants argument."

She was referring to the frozen treat, a gooey yellow confection with gumball eyes, that is modeled after the cartoon character. It is as unhealthy looking, and as irresistible to the character's many young fans, as you might imagine. But no matter the treat, parents say, the argument is the same.

"Once [the truck] is in his sight and ice cream is on his mind, he has to have it. I have to be the one to say 'No,'" parent Dianne Morin said on a recent afternoon, as she watched her 3-year-old son, Michael, play in the park.
"Today, he got one," she added.

"Truly, it should be illegal," said another mother, Sally Etta Sheinfeld, who likened the ice cream truck's proximity to the park to "coercion" and the Spongebob snack to "abuse."

Most parents at the park that afternoon said they did not have a problem giving their kids ice cream—they just prefer not to do it every time they come to the park, particularly in the hours after school and before dinner.

"At least now they have to earn it," joked Randi Larowitz, noting the longer distance from the park entrance to the ice cream truck's new location. "Maybe we should put in an obstacle course, too."

Vrouvakis said he was not bitter about the move, but noted that on some days he has trouble finding a parking spot amid the usual line of parking-permitted government vehicles on the block. Then there are the two days a week that trucks from the farmers' market roll in.

"But for me, it is no matter," he said. "The kids are still going to come."
Indeed they do. It was 2:51 on a recent afternoon, one minute after the release of students from nearby P.S. 234, and already there was a line half-a-dozen deep outside the ice cream man's window.

One of the first customers was Melanie Zrihen, a mother of two and a regular. As her daughter pointed to a picture of an ice cream sandwich on the side of the truck ("the usual"), Zrihen pointed to the building on the corner of Greenwich and Reade Streets where they live.

"It's a problem, and it doesn't matter if the truck is parked there or here," she said. "My kids can see it from our apartment window."