More than two feet of fresh snow fell in Park City, Utah last week, perfect for the throngs of skiers gathered at Park City Mountain, the largest ski resort in the United States. But instead of experiencing powder, skiers and snowboarders faced long lift lines, limited terrain and widespread frustration caused by a ski patrol strike.
“Five minutes of bliss for a 50 minute wait in line,” one Park City skier said on Instagram.
The Park City Professional Ski Patrollers Association, which represents 204 ski patrollers and mountain safety personnel, went on strike Dec. 27 against Vail Resorts, which owns Park City Mountain. Ski patrollers are seeking a $2 increase in their base hourly wage, from $21 to $23. The union presented its proposal in September with the goal of reaching an agreement before the ski season, but Vail did not agree, leaving the patrols on strike during the busy holiday season.
Vail Resorts said it has raised patrol salaries by more than 50 percent over the past four seasons.
“We’re proud of the significant investments we’ve made in all of our employees, including patrol, that have far exceeded inflation,” Bill Rock, president of Vail Resorts Mountain Division, said in a statement Friday.
Without enough patrollers to clear trails, respond to accidents and mitigate avalanches, about a quarter of Park City’s trails are currently open. Normally, more than 100 patrollers cover Park City’s 7,300 skiable acres, but the association said only 30 to 35 patrollers are on the mountain, many of them supervisors or patrollers who come from other Vail ski areas.
“We deeply regret that this has any level of impact on the visitor experience and are grateful to our thousands of employees who work hard every day to enable the Park City Mountain experience and to open the ground we can safely open,” Mr. Rock said in the statement.
Vail Resorts and the Park City patrolmen’s union negotiate almost daily with a federal mediator. Both sides hinted they were making progress, but the union said Vail was “still a long way from addressing most of our members’ concerns.”
Vail Resorts bought Park City in 2014 and combined it with a neighboring ski resort called Canyons the following year. The Canyons Ski Patrol was unionized in 2001, and when the two ski patrols merged, the Park City patrolmen voted to join the union, which is now part of the Communications Workers of America.
Vail Resorts, valued at nearly $10 billion, owns and operates 42 ski areas in North America, Australia and Europe. Last year, Vail sold 2.4 million of its Epic Pass, which transformed the ski industry by lowering prices and expanding access for skiers when it was introduced in 2008. But the resulting crowds have led to customer complaints at some resorts and overwhelmed some rural communities dependent on the ski industry.
Ski patrols say they have been encouraged by an outpouring of online and in-person support. A GoFundMe account currently has more than $200,000 in donations.
“We’ve had community members stop by our line every day, letting us know they support us, dropping off food and donating to our strike fund,” said Margaux Klingensmith, who has been a Park City patrolman for six years and is also the director of operations. for the union.
But that’s cold comfort to frustrated skiers who can’t get the goods. Instead of taking to social media to post videos of flying snowflakes and big jumps, they share scenes of endless lift lines.
“The amount of money spent not skiing is abysmal,” said one vacationer quoted by local news outlet, TownLift.
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