General California Guidelines
California sets minimum standards for local municipalities in both basic design needs for Health Code construction standards as well as Food Handling Standards. Below you will find copies of the California Retail Health Code, and the HUD building standards for construction of mobile carts and trucks. While the way that these standards are enforced will vary between individual California municipalities, they are a good starting point for understanding the basic requirements for new construction of mobile catering vehicles. In addition, they’ll be absolutely necessary if you are purchasing a pre-owned vehicle or cart, because (generally) you’ll be required to bring that unit up to current standards in order to get health, fire and police approval of your vehicle.
For specific cart and truck design and building questions, please check out this page.