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Urban street vending is an integral part of everyday public life and can contribute to vibrant and lively streets Yet few cities formally integrate this activity into public space design This is because street vending is a highly contested although transformative phenomenon that has complex interrelationships with other urban entities This paper systematically and quantitatively assesses the breadth and depth of academic literature that studied such a relationship more specifically the influence of street vending on pedestrians experiences and behaviours and thereby identifies gaps in the existing literature A systematic review of 25 peerreviewed journal articles is undertaken to provide an assessment of the geographic extent disciplinary scope timeline of publications keywords methods theories constructs and concepts This review concludes that the existing research is emerging but rapidly accelerating and crossdisciplinary Although the research was predominantly conducted in the Global South it is largely affiliated with the Global North with limited NorthSouth partnerships The literature is largely qualitative indicating a propensity for skewed perspectives It also lacks theoretical applications exclusive to pedestrianvendor relationships Finally potential areas where future researchers may expand and influence the knowledge domain are identified This includes developing multicontextual global perspectives through NorthSouth partnerships and combining or independently applying grounded theory mixed methods and case study research to broaden theoretical and empirical bases
