The resort renewed a decade-long lease with the Silver Star Property Owners Association at the end of October.
“Instead of waiting to the last minute, we felt it would be good to be partners with the Park City Mountain resort,” Silver Star board member Cary McMillan said. “[COO] Deirdra Walsh and her team have been fabulous, and we got the lease signed basically a year early.”
The Silver Star lift is the owner association’s golden goose, since its members run all the lodging and commercial activities at the base area in Park City’s Thaynes neighborhood.
“We don't pay for Park City to have the lift there, and they don't pay us,” McMillan explained. “It's a win-win. We have the land, and they have the lift.”
Park City Mountain relies on a network of lease agreements to operate. That’s how Canyons Village lifts operate, and the ticket window at Town Lift, for example.
Vail Resorts only owns about 200 acres of the mountain outright and leases the rest from affiliates of the Canadian corporation Talisker, which bought out United Park City Mines.
Park City Mountain spokesperson John Kanaly says some people forget there’s a fourth way up the mountain besides Mountain Village, Canyons Village and Town Lift.
There’s not much parking — only a Green 2 and Blue 3 transit stop — but Silver Star was actually the first base area.
“The Spiro tunnel is where you rode underneath a mountain up to Thaynes, then you took an elevator up,” Kanaly said. “That's literally where people started skiing on this mountain for the first time.”
Buses, pizzas and trails around town are now named for the former “skier subway.”
Vail Resorts’ EpicPromise foundation is a financial supporter of KPCW.
