Park City, Utah

The Land

Park City is located at the intersection of the Uintah and Wasatch mountain ranges. As the mountains form a T intersection, Park City sits on the northern slopes of the Uintah Mountains, east of the Wasatch Front. Above the town, a 10,000-foot ridge forms the dividing line between Salt Lake and Summit Counties, and then gradually descends to the valley floor. The ridge also protects several natural bowls, or cirques, from the high winds associated with storm systems flowing from the west. This natural feature proved to be very advantageous once the town moved to a ski resort economy.

The flora covering the slopes of the Uintahs around Park City is divided into vegetation zones, expressions of changes in altitude. The lowest elevations, specifically the valley floor, are covered by a combination of grasses and sagebrush. Rising above the valley floor, the foothills display a mixture of Gambel oak, sometimes referred to as scrub oak, and mountain maple, which thrives on the northern, less exposed slopes. In the higher elevations, aspen, white fir, Douglas fir, and spruce trees blend together on the slopes before they give way to moraine at the tree line.

Because it is much higher in elevation than Salt Lake City, Park City enjoys a cooler and wetter climate. Summer temperatures average 10 to 15 degrees cooler while winter temperatures can average as much as 25 degrees cooler. The Sierra Nevada Mountains in eastern California cast a rain shadow over Utah's Great Basin, but the Wasatch Mountains run perpendicular to the prevailing winds, producing an orographic barrier that induces precipitation. A narrow zone at the base of the Wasatch Mountains receives 13 to 18 inches of precipitation annually, while the higher elevations typically receive more than 50 inches. The higher elevations receive the majority of their precipitation in snow; the peaks surrounding Park City typically accumulate anywhere from 50 to 100 inches of snow each winter. The annual snowmelts send 8 to 10 million acre-feet of water surging down the drainages in late spring and early summer. This does not create a problem, because the Wasatch and Uintah's thickly vegetated watersheds handle the runoff.

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