The top staffer at the Park City Chamber/Bureau is scheduled to travel to Italy for the Winter Olympics next month, the second consecutive Games the tourism organization will study as the community prepares for the 2034 Games.
Chamber/Bureau President and CEO Jennifer Wesselhoff will be part of the official state delegation headed to Milan and the wider Games region in Italy. She will participate in an observer program organized by the International Olympic Committee. Wesselhoff is scheduled to be in Italy from the opening ceremonies on Feb. 6 until Feb. 16. She is scheduled to spend time in Milan and the Italian Alps mountain resort of Cortina d’Ampezzo.
Wesselhoff, in prepared answers to a Park Record inquiry about the trip, said she will focus on learning about “destination readiness, visitor experience, communications, marketing and branding, and community impacts.”
“I’m looking forward to absorbing as much information as I can, since this will be my first Winter Olympic Games,” she said.
The Chamber/Bureau will fund Wesselhoff’s travel, lodging and meals. There is no charge to participate in the observer program, she noted.
Park City and Summit County delegations plan to travel to the Games as part of the same observer program. It appears some of the travelers will be in Italy at different points of the Winter Olympics and will visit separate locations.
The Chamber/Bureau is expected to prepare for the 2034 Games internally as well as contribute to the broader planning in the community. The Chamber/Bureau, over time, will likely address topics such as the prospects of long-term tourism benefits related to the Games and the impact of the event on the Park City area’s sustainability efforts.
The Chamber/Bureau will also likely have a role when the area tourism industry prepares for the ski season of 2033-2034. The industry will almost certainly attempt to guard against a drop in visitor numbers that winter, with the possibility that skiers may hesitate out of concern for Games-related impacts on terrain, lodging availability and pricing.
The upcoming trip will be Wesselhoff’s second to a Games in preparation for the Winter Olympics in Utah. She traveled alongside others from the Park City area and elsewhere in the state to the Summer Olympics in Paris in 2024. The IOC, on the eve of those Games, awarded the event in 2034 to Salt Lake City.
The contingent used the trip to France as an early learning opportunity about the mechanics of the Olympics. Some of the key elements of the staging of a Summer Olympics, such as transportation and security, are similar in many ways to those of a Winter Olympics. Park City-area travelers who visited France returned with observations about traffic, transportation systems, security, communications and impacts on businesses.
The Games in Italy are the first of two Winter Olympics that are scheduled before 2034, with the 2030 Games in the south of France being the other. There are also two Summer Olympics before 2034 — in Los Angeles in 2028 and Brisbane, Australia, in 2032. It seems likely figures from the Park City area will travel to the upcoming Games as part of the preparations for 2034.
The Park City area is key to the overall plans for the 2034 Winter Olympics. Park City Mountain, Deer Valley Resort and the Utah Olympic Park will be competition venues, making the community integral to the transportation, security and celebration blueprints. The area played a similar role during the 2002 Winter Olympics. The planning for 2034 will stretch through the Wasatch Back with another competition venue — Soldier Hollow Nordic Center — in nearby Wasatch County.
The City Hall delegation traveling to the Milano Cortina Games is slated to include Mayor Ryan Dickey, Park City Councilor Tana Toly and acting City Manager Jodi Emery. Another city councilor, Bill Ciraco, plans to travel to Italy at his own expense and independent from the official delegation. Summit County Councilor Tonja Hanson and County Manager Shayne Scott are also set to travel to the Games as part of the observer program.
The 2026 Games will unfold across a large swath of northern Italy, with some of the competition venues well outside the host city of Milan. Cortina d’Ampezzo is anticipated to be of special interest to travelers from the Park City area, though the details of the various itineraries are still being finalized. Cortina d’Ampezzo is a famed mountain resort and will host skiing, the sliding sports and curling. There are similarities between the two communities, with Cortina d’Ampezzo and Park City each being internationally known ski destinations.