It Was Only a Matter of Time

After quite possibly the most beautiful September on record, it appears this will all come to an end as the first significant winter storm is forecast for later this week. Heavy rains starting Wednesday, turning to snow Thursday with the snow level lowering to around 6,000 feet; well below Park City which is at 7,000'. While everyone will be sad to see these warm, beautiful cloudless days come to an end, it's also exciting to see the snow come as it is a preview to  the upcoming ski season. Come back next week for photos of snow-covered mountains combined with fall foliage, usually quite spectacular.

The other big news for the week here in Park City was an announcement by the Canyons Resort that they would like to connect the Canyons with Solitude Mountain Resort in Big Cottonwood Canyon by chairlift. Not surprisingly, the overall reaction has been less than warm. In fact, downright chilly. I say not surprisingly because as long as I have been in Park City (since 1984) there have been various proposals to connect some or all seven of the local ski resorts together. This can be accomplished with about four chairlifts and would make the most incredible ski resort in North America, if not the world. While this is quite common in Europe, connecting ski resorts owned by different entities is virtually unheard-of in the U.S. I only know of one that has done this, and that is Snowbird and Alta in Little Cottonwood Canyon here in Utah. The strongest and most vocal opponent to connecting the Canyons and Solitude is the Save Our Canyon organization. This is a group of backcountry skiers who strongly oppose any new development in either Little or Big Cottonwood Canyon and have been able to rally enough support to block any ski area expansion. I'm not sure that Talisker Corp, the owner of the Canyons Resort fully grasps the fight that they're going to have on this. In the 7 days since this announcement has come out, there have been two editorials and several letters in our local paper opposing the expansion and the Save Our Canyons organization has already posted this on their website and is garnering opposition. So this will be an interesting battle to see what happens, but I can assure you, it is unlikely that there will be a chairlift connecting the Canyons and Solitude for the next ski season. This will be a many year fight primarily because any proposed skiing and lifts crosses Forest Service land.

In real estate news, there was an article recapping last summer's visitor count here in Park City and while specific visitor numbers have not been tallied interviews with various hotel owners or management companies indicated that the summer was a mixed bag. Overall, visitor nights were up but not consistently throughout the summer and average daily rental rate was up only slightly if at all. For the upcoming ski season, the major holidays (Christmas, Sundance, President's week) are just about completely booked and I have heard the Deer Valley ski school is completely booked for Christmas. The trend for the last few years has been for winter visitors, other than for the major holidays, to book closer and closer to their actual trip. Generally waiting to see which resorts have the best snow, where they can get the best rates, etc. If this storm comes in this week as expected, we typically see a marked increase in phone reservations as early snowfalls usually makes national news and piques the interest of skiers.

So, winter is coming! Continue your workouts and I look forward to seeing you on the ski slopes this winter.