Manuel Alfaro, the owner of El Fuego food truck, said his son had been saving a spot on Solutions Drive since 7:30 a.m., using a personal car. When Alfaro arrived with his truck around 10 a.m., Guapo’s food truck kept him from taking the space, he alleged.

“They refused to leave, and they were blocking traffic,” Alfaro said. “What other choice did I have but call the police?”

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Caitlin Turner, a manager at Guapo’s, said Alfaro’s version of events is “absolutely not true.”

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“We were trying to figure out how to fit all the food trucks, and then one guy took it too far, damaging our truck. And he was the one to call the cops, which is weird,” she said.

When the Fairfax County Police arrived, they sent all eight food trucks on Solutions Drive packing. It turns out that in Fairfax County, food trucks cannot vend in a business district. And the cost of operating elsewhere in the county is a steep $16,375 fee. A proposed revision to zoning rules, currently being considered by the county, would reduce food truck owners’ costs to an annual $100 fee, plus other permits and licenses.

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However, the larger barrier is a state ordinance that bans vending on state-maintained highways, said Che Ruddell-Tabisola, executive director of the DMV Food Truck Association.

“The way Fairfax has grown, there’s a number of roads that you wouldn’t think are state-maintained highways — the speed limit is 35 miles per hour, there’s parking on both sides of the street — but they are,” he said. “Solutions Drive happens to fall into that category.”

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Food truck owners were dismayed that the parking argument got everyone booted from a prime spot.

“I’ve really built a connection with my customers here. It hurts that I can’t come back,” said Sherwin Aminifar, owner of the Village Cafe Express food truck, which was parked on Solution Drive before being sent away by police. “It’s like losing a girlfriend or something.”

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Guapo’s and El Fuego also won’t be returning anytime soon to the Tysons area, their respective owners say.

“For the past four years we’ve been vending there, and now all of the sudden the county is deciding to enforce this?” Alfaro said. “Honestly, it has got me baffled.”

Roger Henriquez, a Fairfax County Police spokesperson, said they were simply responding to a complaint, not initiating a crackdown.

“We don’t just go and camp out somewhere and look for someone not having a solicitor’s license,” he said.

For a truly harmonious food truck landscape, it’ll take more than just updated laws, Ruddell-Tabisola said.