To Tracy Meier, the National Ability Center’s chief program and education officer, skiing and snowboarding aren’t just recreation. They’re therapy, confidence builders and community connection for adaptive athletes and people with disabilities, she told the Park City Planning Commission on Wednesday.
Meier supports proposed ski lift upgrades at Park City Mountain, where her organization provides about 5,000 lessons a season.
“These improvements ensure that outdoor recreation is available for everyone,” she said.
Park City Mountain is seeking conditional use permits to replace its Eagle and Eaglet chairlifts with a new high-speed, six-passenger detachable chairlift and upgrade its six-passenger Silverlode Express with an eight-passenger lift.
The Planning Commission discussed the proposed upgrades Wednesday with city staffers and resort representatives, and took public input. Commissioners voted to continue the matter to May 27 for more public input and possible final action on the permit requests.
Commissioner Adam Strachan, an attorney, recused himself from the talks because he has represented Park City Mountain in personal injury cases.
Critics are concerned about the potential impacts of increased traffic, bigger crowds and parking issues caused by the improvements. The resort says the upgrades reduce wait times in the base portal and would not draw additional crowds to the slopes.
The discussion focused on parking, traffic and transportation.
The resort has 1,712 parking spaces — 1,227 on surface lots, 385 in parking garages and 100 in an employee parking lot. Andrew Leatham, Park City’s winter peak-day traffic operations manager, said the lots at Park City Mountain typically are 65% to 75% full, even on busy days.
The proposed traffic and parking mitigation plan includes a focus on increasing average vehicle occupancy and incentivizing transit ridership data for guests and employees.
The steps include growing the employee vanpool programs in the Wasatch Back and Wasatch Front, increasing participation in the Ride On Winter Rewards programs to increase employee carpooling and vanpooling, requiring a parking agreement between the Park City School District and the resort each year, and requiring a review for an alternate plan if school district parking is unavailable or decreases.
The city staff is recommending that conditions to get the permits include formalizing the reservation and paid parking program, addressing continued improvements to the base area circulation and mitigations to the surrounding neighborhoods, and addressing future changes that may require contingency plans.
The resort plan says the Eagle Lift replacement would increase uphill capacity by 15.56% and the Silverlode uphill capacity by 20%.
“Park City Mountain finds no clear evidence of a causal relationship between increased uphill capacity and increased guest visitation,” the plan says. “The applicant’s voluntary implementation of the paid parking and reservation system has been effective in addressing traffic, creating an average surplus of approximately 474 parking spaces, even on high visitation days.”
Deirdra Walsh, Park City Mountain vice president and chief operating officer, said the lift upgrades represent a transformative investment in the resort.
“It reflects our commitment to delivering a world-class mountain experience to our guests,” she said.
Park City Mountain initially got an administrative conditional use permit, which the planning director in 2022 approved. That decision was appealed to the Planning Commission by three citizens who were concerned the improvements would cause the resort to exceed the comfortable carry capacity, or CCC, a ski-industry metric that measures the size of crowds that a resort can accommodate.
The Planning Commission determined Park Mountain’s parking mitigation plan did not meet required criteria and denied the resort’s application for a permit. The resort took the case to Third District Court, which upheld the commission, and last year the Utah Court of Appeal affirmed that ruling. Park Mountain applied for new conditional use permits in January.
Angela Moschetta, who was one of the people who filed the appeal, said Wednesday the improvements will significantly increase lift capacity and urged the commissioners to hold off voting until they have a complete record, including a CCC analysis.
Others who gave input were in favor of the improvements.
Nathan Rafferty, president and CEO of Ski Utah, said he views the upgrade as an infrastructure replacement and not as an expansion.
Noting the Winter Olympics are being held in Utah in 2034, he said, “I think having a world-class infrastructure means a world-class experience.”
Emily Fisher, executive director of Youth Sports Alliance, said the lift upgrades are investments in accessibility, belonging, opportunity and the future of the mountain community.
And Jennifer Wesselhoff, president and CEO of the Park City Chamber of Commerce & Visitors Bureau, pointed out the upgrades would be done at no cost to taxpayers. She said replacing the Eagle lifts and upgrading the Silverlode Lift will ease congestion, shorten wait times “and make our terrain more accessible for all.”
“Park City is a resort town,” Wesselhoff said. “It’s the foundation of who we are, our economy, our community and our quality of life. And sometimes I think we forget that when our resorts thrive, so do we. Our businesses, our nonprofits, our employees, our residents all depend on it. Supporting smart investment and resort infrastructure isn’t just good for visitors. It’s good for all of us who live and work here.”