Park City Locals Defend Against Vail Resorts

Help Us Hold Vail Resorts Accountable — and Set a National Precedent

June 2025 Update:

It’s been more than three years since we challenged Vail Resorts' overcrowding of Park City Mountain, and they’re still dragging this out in court. We won at the Planning Commission level. We won in District Court. We’re now in the Utah Court of Appeals, and next stop is the State Supreme Court. Meanwhile, Park City Mountain hasn’t applied to upgrade so much as a toilet on the Park City 84060 side of the resort. Why? Because they’d rather outspend and outlast us than comply with the law and provide a safe, functional resort experience.

Park City, Utah is home to both an Epic and an Ikon resort, making it ground zero in the national battle of corporate ski resort overcrowding. In 2022, four local residents (just regular skiers fed up with gridlock, lift breakdowns, and unsafe conditions) decided enough was enough. We appealed a permit Vail Resorts received to expand lift infrastructure at Park City Mountain, exposing their failure to abide by legal daily skier capacity limits.

This fight isn’t about opposing lift upgrades. It’s about requiring ski resorts to follow the law and put pe.

Why It Matters

What’s happening in Park City is happening everywhere from Breckenridge to Whistler, Stowe to Tahoe. If we win, our case will set a powerful legal precedent for ski towns across North America. Cities and counties will finally be able to enforce capacity limits and take back control from mega-pass operators like Vail Resorts and Alterra (Ikon).

What We Uncovered

Vail Resorts submitted misleading numbers in their application, and they intentionally obscure actual visitor capacity. Our city’s Planning Commission agreed, ruling in our favor and inviting Vail to resubmit a permit using transparent data. Vail initially agreed and then reversed course.

Instead of complying, Vail has spent the past three years and millions of dollars fighting four locals through multiple levels of the court system.

Their goal? Exhaust our resources. Maintain overcrowding. And avoid any legal precedent that forces them to cap skier numbers, invest in infrastructure, or prioritize guest and employee safety.

Meanwhile, Park City Mountain has allowed basic maintenance to fall apart. Chairlifts regularly fail. The resort’s mechanics union was pressed for a statement two seasons ago, and ironically, the lifts that broke weren’t even the ones they sought to upgrade. At this point, the only thing standing in the way of improvements is Vail’s own legal strategy.

We’ve held our ground this long, but we can’t do it without you.

We represented ourselves in the early stages, but rules around Utah court proceedings forced us to hire an, Hyrum Bosserman of Bennett Tueller Johnson & Deere. We've exhausted our personal savings and need help covering ongoing legal fees to see this through.

Your support helps:

Contributions can be made anonymously. Every dollar is a statement: that corporate overreach has limits, that communities matter, and that the little guy can still win.

Thank you for standing with us.