The members of the exclusively Republican congressional delegation that represents Park City and outlying Summit County, even before they were elected, would have understood places like Old Town and Pinebrook would not turn into core locations of electoral support.
The Park City area is, of course, one of the state’s best-known strongholds for the Democrats. It is a nice feather in the cap of a Democrat to win wealthy, desirable Summit County in a congressional contest, but the winning usually just about ends there. The more populous, Republican-leaning parts of a district, or the state in the case of a Senate campaign, put the GOP in office.
That is one of the reasons the people of Park City and wider Summit County should be pleased with the $25 million in grant monies that were awarded to the area for a proposed traffic-fighting measure along the S.R. 224 corridor, the busy primary entryway to Park City. The funds went to Summit County and High Valley Transit and are expected to be put toward improvements like transit lanes along a state highway that has long suffered terrible traffic jams through the ski season.
The grant is welcome at a time when the community – Parkites and those who reside outside the city limits – are demanding action on traffic. The $25 million, which will also fund the procurement of new buses, will not solve the backups on S.R. 224, but it should not be seen as just a gesture from Washington to a small community. The monies, instead, represent a bipartisanship effort between the Democratic leaders of Summit County and the Republican congressional delegation that should result in progress, even if a solution to traffic will remain elusive.
Bipartisanship between Park City, Summit County and the congressional delegation has not always been reachable. The differences between a mountain resort and the population centers on the Wasatch Front that grab the attention of the delegation are oftentimes too great to overcome in a political sense.
The work that went into the award of $25 million to Summit County, though, drives home the point that bipartisanship is possible.