A small group of press, Park City representatives and city staff boarded the Main Street Trolley on Wednesday morning for a quick victory lap celebrating the 50th anniversary of Park City Transit.
Park City Transportation Director Tim Sanderson welcomed everyone and introduced Mayor Nann Worel, who gave short remarks as the trolley left the Old Town Transit Center and looped around Main Street.
“Today is more than about an anniversary,” Worel said. “It’s about a decision that Park City made five decades ago that continues to shape how we connect, how we move around and how we care about our beautiful city.”
The mayor said that, half a century ago, the city faced a question similar to the one it faces today: How do we grow without losing what makes us so special?
“The answer, even then, wasn’t putting more cars on pavement; it was people-centered transportation,” Worel said. “Choosing free public transit was a statement of values, access over congestion, community over convenience and long-term thinking over short-term fixes.”
Worel also took time to thank the staff who make the transit system run.
“I want to thank my heroes: our transit operators, mechanics, planners and support staff, because many of them have devoted decades to this system,” she said.
She acknowledged that bus operators often act as unofficial tour guides and concierges for visitors.
“These folks are more than just drivers. They are beautiful representatives of Park City,” Worel said.
After the jaunt, attendees enjoyed free coffee and doughnuts at the Transit Center. Sanderson gave a quick update on what’s coming up for the transportation department.
“The exciting stuff that we’ve got coming up is Recreate 248, which will be probably the largest project as we prepare for the Olympics,” Sanderson said.
Recreate 248 is a city study that aims to identify alternative transportation solutions for traveling on S.R. 248 and hopefully reduce traffic congestion. Sanderson said the team is preparing to present an update in January.
“We’ve defined the corridor, which is along 248,” Sanderson said. “There’s no rail trail element. I can assure you: no rail trail element.”
The city is still looking at two potential modes: bus and rail. The transportation team in January will recommend one as the locally preferred alternative and whether it would be curbside or run in the center.
In the meantime, the city’s Ride On program is starting up again. It’s an online platform where users can log trips they’ve made by bike, bus, even walking — anything other than a single-occupancy vehicle trip. The different modes offer different point values. For the 2024-25 season, the city awarded a $1,500 grand prize. Second place received $1,000.
“For those that really enjoy Ride On, they get really competitive, which is wonderful,” Sanderson said, “because not only is it using transit, it’s a little fun. You get a reward. It’s kind of the gamification of getting to work.”
Transit manager Bill DeGroot was also on hand to talk about the department’s history.
“In 1974, there was a hotel shuttle that was 25 cents a piece that the hotels ran between what is the high school, which is currently City Hall, and the ski resorts and the hotels.”
In 1975, the City Council made a resolution to open the first fixed route. The city signed a contract with Gray Lines and the Salt Lake Transportation Company for a service running down Park Street and connecting the ski resorts with the old high school and down through the current golf course area.
Since then, it’s always been free.
“Currently, we’re still one of the few in a resort community that’s free,” DeGroot said. “That’s really important because the whole idea of transit is to try and give people alternatives to driving a car, and to have that much forethought in the 70s is kind of amazing.”
In 1977, the city offered its first ADA bus after the transit tax allowance was passed in the state legislature. City residents in 1978 passed the local transit tax, and the bus began full winter service, carrying 165,000 passengers that season.
In 1983, the city received its first federal grant money through the Utah Department of Transportation, and the system was officially named “Park City Transit” from “Park City Metro.” By 1989, the system had served its 5,000,000th passenger. Almost 20 years later, in 2007, the service hit 2,000,000 passengers in one year alone. The system now averages about 1.4 million riders each year since 2021, according to the city.
The city started rolling out more modern improvements in the 2010s, like real-time bus tracking and electric buses.
These days, the city is focused on delivering dependable and frequent service, which DeGroot said is called “clock face” — buses running at consistent intervals, typically on the hour, the 15-minute, the 30-minute and the 45-minute marks of the hour.
The city’s network is also now connected to the surrounding transportation networks, which allow riders to see how Park City Transit service connects with other service providers like High Valley and UTA networks.
“We just launched a service, the final part of our service, just about three weeks ago, that allowed us to actually plan a trip all the way through UTA to the airport to connect anywhere within the state and everything else,” DeGroot said. “And so you can truly plan your trip.”
A full timeline of the transportation department’s history is available online at parkcity.gov.
Plus, last year, the department added the 20 Tan line, which services the Park Meadows and Royal Street neighborhoods and connects them to Park City resorts, Main Street and other key spots in town. It now also reaches Aerie Drive as a result of community feedback, according to Sanderson.
And this summer, the department started offering trail service to the Bonanza Flat and Blood Lake trailheads via the 9 Purple. Parking is now paid at the lots, incentivizing people to use the buses, which are equipped with new bike racks that can carry up to eight bikes, and dogs are allowed as long as they’re muzzled and well behaved.
For more on Park City Transit’s history and to see bus schedules, visit parkcity.gov/departments/transit-bus.