Parkites had braced for a holiday weekend of bumper-to-bumper traffic. But despite high visitation in town for Presidents Day, the roads were less crowded than anticipated on Saturday and Sunday.
That came as a pleasant surprise to resident Rich Ford, who took a video while cruising down S.R. 248 this weekend.
He said he thinks most of Park City’s winter congestion comes from locals and visitors from close by in Utah, especially people driving alone.
“When we talk about these traffic issues that we have, occasionally I hear people want to blame the tourists,” he said. “It’s not the tourists that are creating the traffic issues.”
Utah skiers with Epic Local passes couldn’t ski Park City Mountain either Saturday or Sunday, while for Ikon passholders, Deer Valley reservations were completely sold out. Fewer locals on the mountain than usual, Ford said, led to fewer cars on the roads.
Still, though traffic may have belied the number of vacationers in town, there’s no doubt Park City was packed with visitors this weekend.
Lodging was over 80% full over the weekend, with more advance bookings than a year ago.
And Old Town was bustling with tourists. Brinlee McBride works at Shirt Off My Back on Main Street.
“We’ve been pretty busy,” she said. “Usually it starts slow in the mornings, but after skiing ends, we get quite a big crowd in here.”
She said holidays are especially busy for tourists shopping on Main Street – but like Ford, she was happy to discover traffic wasn’t too slow on her commute this weekend from Wasatch County.
Then Monday hit, and just like that, traffic was back to the old wait and crawl.
