For the first time, a gourmet food truck festival is coming to Worcester.

The Food Truck Festivals of New England will bring 30 to 35 food trucks to Park Avenue, from noon to 4 p.m. on Saturday, July 14.

The group has scheduled 11 one-day food truck festivals in Boston, Topsfield, Worcester, Barnstable, Lowell and Framingham over the course of the spring, summer and fall, with other dates and places listed as “Coming soon!”

The group is selling tickets to its Worcester event for $30, which gets the buyer a taste of the food available at all the food trucks at the festival. There is also a $40 ticket for VIPs, who can come an hour early, get a goody bag with coupons from local businesses, and face shorter lines. Drinks are extra for either ticket.

“People seem to love gourmet food when there are a lot of options all in one place,” said Ann Marie Aigner, head of a marketing firm in Boston, and the organizer of the food truck festivals. “People don’t seem to mind waiting in line for a grilled cheese sandwich. It’s part of the experience.”

The trucks will park at the curb along Park Avenue from Highland Street to Elm Street, according to Ms. Aigner, and people will line up at the trucks in Elm Park. Most of them will probably eat the food in Elm Park, as well.

The distinction is important, because it means the festival does not have to apply for a license to be in the park, since the trucks will be on the street.

While the festival has state licenses, it is still negotiating with the city to close that section of Park Avenue, to hire police details and to have a “beer garden” that a subcontractor would like to open on Park Avenue for the event. Again, the beer garden won’t be in the park, either, avoiding the whole problem of getting the parks department to agree to allow alcohol in the park. The subcontractor will have to obtain a one-day liquor license from the city’s licensing board.

One thing the festival will not offer, however, is live entertainment. The bands that played at a couple of the group’s events last year left a bad taste in the mouths of festival-goers, Ms. Aigner said.

“The suggestion that came back was, ‘Why don’t you lose the band and put two more food trucks there?’ ” she said.

Gourmet food trucks are a West Coast trend that has been moving east for several years, she said. While some of the trucks will offer hot dogs, tacos, barbecued ribs and the aforementioned grilled cheese sandwiches — not what one would usually call “gourmet” — there will also be lobster “sliders” and lobster bisque “shots.” In this case, a slider means bite-sized, and a shot means a non-alcoholic, small portion of soup. Other temptations include Asian noodles, lobster macaroni and cheese, fried clams, and ice cream hoagies (huh?).

And there will be cupcakes, which are also very trendy right now.

Ms. Aigner said the lineup for the Worcester festival is still being set, but that it will include at least 30 food trucks from Maine to Connecticut, at least five of them serving desserts. She hopes that publicity about the event will bring some Worcester-based food trucks to the festival, but to be included they would have to contact her at www.foodtruckfestivalsofne.com.

The city has a tortured history with food vendors, who say a 2008 ordinance has forced many of them out of the city. If you recall, the City Council voted 6-5 in 2008 on a more restrictive street vendor ordinance. The new ordinance prevents street vendors from selling after midnight, which put a crimp in some vendors’ business. (Most of those vendors sold from carts, not trucks). But what absolutely killed street vendors was the provision that they receive written permission from restaurants located within 250 feet of where they planned to open. Vendors have lobbied the City Council to soften the ordinance, but it still stands.

According to Ms. Aigner, the food truck festival is coming to Worcester at the suggestion of City Councilor-at-large Rick Rushton. Mr. Rushton was one of five councilors who voted against the revised street vendor ordinance. At the time, he argued it was too restrictive. But the council, bowing to restaurant owners who said vendors stole their customers without paying taxes and the like, passed the ordinance.

“The vendor debacle of a couple of summers ago has prevented us from taking advantage of mobile food,” said Mr. Rushton, noting it is a hot trend in urban markets across the country. “This is a soft way of trying to reintroduce the issue.”

Contact Aaron Nicodemus at anicodemus@telegram.com or at (508) 793-9245.

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