It has been a joyous few weeks in Park City, starting with the great celebration on July 24 when the International Olympic Committee selected Salt Lake City to host the 2034 Winter Olympics.
Later that same day, a crowd of 4,000 gathered at Utah Olympic Park to celebrate the selection. Park City and Summit County sent officials to Paris to attend IOC meetings and learn about how to run the Games. They returned from France with observations about the Olympic transportation system and the impact on businesses. And City Hall, the county courthouse and the Park City Chamber/Bureau are preparing to hire a consultant to develop a plan for the Games that outlines a decade of work.
But the excitement surrounding the awarding of the Winter Olympics and the turbulent final months of the bidding period may have distracted, at least temporarily, from widespread public concerns about a range of issues, including traffic, the state of the holiday industry, growth and affordability.
The IOC’s selection propelled Park City and Summit County into the planning phase for the Winter Olympics after years of efforts focused on the bid. The Games map includes three competition sites in the Park City area – Park City Mountain, Deer Valley Resort and Utah Olympic Park – and the community will be critical to transportation, security and celebration plans. Park City and Summit County officials are expected to begin developing a plan for the Games in the coming months that will remain in place even after the cauldron dies down in 2034.
But Park City’s mayor and city council must accomplish this task while trying to lead a population that was already deeply concerned about the state of the community before the Games were awarded. The upcoming Winter Olympics, still more than nine years in the future, could add to the worries as Park City residents consider the potential impact the event could have on what are already such difficult issues. During the bid process, there were signs that some Park City residents were concerned about the Winter Olympics, while others expressed excitement about the prospect of Games. A series of conversations with the community in the fall of 2022 illustrated the wide range of opinions.
As Park City has entered a second Winter Olympics era, another recent survey of Park City residents’ sentiments, covering many of the most pressing issues, becomes notable again. The National Community Survey, conducted on behalf of the city government in late 2022 and early 2023, showed that cracks were forming, or worse, widening, in Park City. Some of the findings were particularly damaging, and seemed to lend credence to the widespread fear that was so clearly felt at the time of the survey.
One of the key questions was about Park City’s overall development. Only 41% said it was excellent or good, a drop in responses over the course of five surveys beginning in 2011. The drop was 29 percentage points from the 70% who found Park City’s overall development to be excellent or good in 2011. A question about Park City’s cost of living elicited a disastrous response: only 12% rated it as excellent or good. The figure was 14 percentage points lower than the 26% response in 2013.
Other reactions that are relevant in the context of the beginning of an Olympic era were:
- Traffic flow on main roads fell from 68% in 2011 to 25% rated “excellent” or “good”.
- The user-friendliness of public transport fell from 89% in 2013 to 67% of respondents rating it as “excellent” or “good”.
- Overall trust in Park City’s government fell from 66% in 2013 to 56% rating it “excellent” or “good.”
- The municipality is considered a place to visit and received a strong response with 92% rating it as “excellent” or “good”. However, this was a slight decrease from the 96% rating in 2013.
- Overall economic health is excellent or good at 88%, an increase of 7 percentage points from 2013 (81%).
- The overall image or reputation is 83% and is excellent or good, compared to 96% in 2011.
It seems almost certain that the shock of the coronavirus, intense concerns about what Parkites saw as unchecked tourism during the pandemic, and rapidly rising real estate prices at the time greatly influenced the results of the survey conducted in 2022 and 2023. Yet the community appears to be stuck in a kind of depression, if not a malaise that is difficult to define, even as Park City emerged stronger from the worst of the pandemic and then entered the final stages of bidding for the Games.
It is impossible to predict what impact the Winter Olympics effort will have on Park City’s problems over the coming decade. The Games could bring new momentum and funding as City Hall and the county courthouse try to get a handle on the traffic and transportation situation. In that scenario, the Games could be hailed as a catalyst for progress in long-standing efforts to combat traffic. At the same time, however, the Winter Olympics could drive up real estate and rental prices, already considered the most expensive in the state, as Park City attracts buyers in the Games era. If that were to happen, the Winter Olympics would likely be blamed in some quarters for exacerbating an already difficult housing situation, especially for ordinary workers.
City Hall is planning the next national citizen survey for late 2024, giving Park City residents the opportunity to consider the impact of the Winter Olympics while answering questions such as whether Park City should host the event.
By then, the celebratory atmosphere surrounding the awarding of the Games this summer will have already given way to the harsh reality of organizing a Winter Olympics in a community already so worried about the future.
Jay Hamburger has been an editor at the Park Record for 27 years.
