white wooden bridge over snow-capped mountains during daytime Photo: Photo by Benjamin Rascoe

The 1981 Town Lift lease stipulates a rent of $10.00 per year for the land and appurtenant rights, to be paid to each landlord over the 70-year term.

PARK CITY, Utah — A winter slip-and-fall incident has escalated into a legal dispute that could affect skier access to Park City Mountain from Main Street via the Town Lift.

New York skier Dina Miller filed suit against Vail Resorts and landowner Brothers III, LLC on April 26, 2024, after suffering a broken leg in the Town Lift Plaza’s public restroom last February. Brothers III, LLC is owned by Patrick, Mike and Ed Sweeney. Brothers III demanded that Vail Resorts defend them in Miller’s lawsuit, citing leases dating back to 1981. The resort refused, arguing that a third party maintained the restroom where Miller fell and that the insurance they had fulfilled their obligations to Brothers III.

The Sweeney family or Brothers III, LLC are prominent landowners in Park City and lease the land to Vail Resorts for the Town Lift and Town Lift plaza. They have also been strong supporters of Matthew Prince’s plans to build a controversial mansion on Treasure Hill near the Town Lift chairlift. The site is regulated by both Sweeney Master Planned Development and Historic Residential (HR) a zoning, which has required a powerful team of attorneys to help push the project through Park City’s to-be-built planning process.

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“The operation of the Town Lift depends on these longstanding agreements,” Brothers III said in court filings, noting how a contractual dispute could affect access to the lift for thousands of skiers who use the Town Lift throughout the season.

The 1981 Town Lift lease stipulates a rent of $10.00 per year for the land and appurtenant rights, to be paid to each landlord over the 70-year term. The agreement states this standard amount without adjustments for inflation or other factors that may increase the rent over time.

Brothers III, LLC is seeking termination of the 1981 lease for Vail Resort’s alleged violation of its terms of the lease.

“We don’t want to shut down the elevator,” Sweeney said The park record. “But we’re just about done. We’re separating from Vail.”

Park City Resorts Chief Operating Officer, Deirdra Walsh said they plan to operate the Town Lift now and into the future.

“Park City Mountain is proud to operate Town Lift, a unique portal from Main Street to America’s largest resort. Town Lift will continue to operate now and into the future through our longstanding and long-term rights in the property. We have valued our relationship to the Sweeney family and followed and honored our agreements related to Town Lift Plaza. Town Lift will begin daily operations in mid-December.”

Main Street Gondola Upgrades

The move to terminate the lease comes amid discussions to improve Park City’s Main Street, which has included talk of a new aerial gondola connecting skiers to Main Street. Exploratory discussions about the location of the gondola have included the Brew Pub lot and the Town Lift Plaza.

During a conversation this fall about Park City’s plans for updates to Main Street, Park City Council member Ryan Dickey talked about the potential for a new gondola and the potential process of upgrading the current Town Lift fixed-grip chairlift.

“We don’t own the Town Lift Plaza, which is owned by the Sweeney family, and it’s private, so we don’t have the elevator, we don’t have the plaza,” Dickey said.

Dickey went on to explain that if the vision for the Main Street redevelopment includes aerial gondola connectivity or elevator upgrades, the city would hope to incentivize its redevelopment by working with the landowner.

Time for Park City to update the infrastructure

In an April, 2 Opinion Piece written by Matthew Princeowner of Park Record and tech billionaire, he claims Park City Municipal is standing in the way of infrastructure updates on Park City Mountain, and is particularly critical of the Town Lift.

Prince laments, “Don’t you want the Town Lift to be an 18-minute move that makes you think about jumping off at Tower 16, after which there’s another 12-minute ride and only another 100 feet of vertical climb? Sorry, not possible until The municipal council has approved a new development agreement.”

Prince proposes to “replace Town and Bonanza with a high-speed gondola to Summit House, including a corner station that supports loading/unloading capacity near the old gondola’s corner station (just to the skier’s right of the bottom of the Silver Queen run).

The Town Lift can currently be used for ski in/out access to residences on Treasure Hill.

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