Park City Mountain Resort will not charge for parking in the surface lots at the Resort Center and at Canyons Village during the upcoming ski season, PCMR said in a statement, ending any lingering speculation in the community that those lots would no longer be free.
PCMR released the statement in response to a Park Record request. There has been chatter in Park City in recent months that PCMR owner Vail Resorts would introduce some sort of paid parking during the upcoming ski season. The Colorado-based firm this summer is building a gondola linking PCMR and Canyons Resort into a single property. It will be the largest mountain resort in the U.S.
The statement, attributed to Bill Rock, the chief operating officer of PCMR, said there “will be no operating changes in parking for the 2015-16 season.”
“The surface lots at the Park City and Canyons Village base areas will remain as unpaid parking,” Rock said in the statement.
Rock also said premium parking at both base areas will continue to be offered for a fee. He said those options are “consistent with last season and includes garage parking in the Park City base and the Sundial surface lot in Canyons village.”
The parking lots are critical to the operations of PCMR. The lot at Canyons Village stretches from just off S.R. 224 toward the base area. It is served by a people mover known as a cabriolet. There are two lots at the Resort Center, a main lot and another one that is commonly referred to as the lower lot.
Any idea of introducing paid parking at PCMR, as well as at Deer Valley Resort, could someday lead to a broad community discussion. Deer Valley’s primary parking lots, situated outside Snow Park Lodge, are free. Paid parking is seen as something that discourages people from driving to their destination. Paid parking, it is argued, encourages people to take transit instead.
There have been widespread complaints about traffic in Park City in recent years. Traffic around PCMR and Deer Valley is especially bad during the ski season even as Park City officials have pushed transit options.
City Hall recently received at least two written comments addressing the idea of paid parking at the resorts. The comments were made anonymously during a June event focused on growth in Park City and the surrounding area. The municipal government later released them.
One of the comments requests transportation options and says “set some very expensive parking rates at resorts & on Main Street. Let residents of Summit County or city specifically have passes that let us move reasonably around,” a Park City resident said.
A person who lives in Prospector and works in Deer Valley, meanwhile, argued for paid parking on Main Street, where parking is paid already during daytime hours, Swede Alley and the resorts. The person mentioned offering park-and-ride lots with “nice/warm/pretty places for them to wait for the buses.”