The planned village for the Deer Valley Resort expansion.
Deer Valley Resort, Utah’s glamorous luxury ski resort high in the Wasatch Mountains and one of America’s top resorts, has announced that it will double in size. The news came from Alterra Mountain Company, the operating company for Deer Valley.
Deer Valley will add an astonishing 3,700 acres of terrain and remain a ski-only destination. The expansion will include a new village, new resort access, and more lodging, dining, and retail. Deer Valley Resort is making it happen by taking over the fledgling Mayflower ski area near Jordanelle Reservoir.
I wrote about the Mayflower Resort for Forbes in 2019: “There’s a new ski resort coming to the Wasatch Mountains of Utah. Or maybe, just maybe, Deer Valley is about to get a lot bigger.”
It took five years to happen, but you didn’t need a crystal ball to see that developing a new resort next to the long-established Deer Valley was a wise strategy. Mayflower’s developer, Extell Development Company, is best known for Manhattan trophy real estate. Alterra Mountain Company has 17 year-round resorts, including Mammoth Mountain, Tremblant, Solitude Mountain Resort, and Stratton Mountain. It also owns the world’s largest heli-skiing operation, CMH Heli-Skiing & Summer Adventures in British Columbia, and the Ikon Pass, which offers access to over 50 mountain destinations.
The planned village for Deer Valley’s expansion.
The expansion, a partnership between Alterra and Extell, will double Deer Valley’s skiable terrain, adding 16 new lifts and a 10-passenger gondola. The new slopes will benefit from the same state-of-the-art snowmaking system, and Deer Valley’s classic and much-praised snow grooming will continue. Alterra promises to maintain the resort’s high-end guest services, which include curbside valet service for gear. The resort will also limit the number of daily skiers and says it will continue the resort’s legendary snowboard ban. Deer Valley is one of only three major U.S. resorts (the others are Alta, Utah, and Mad River Glen, Vermont) to preserve a mountain as the domain of skiers.
The project is scheduled to unfold over the next three seasons, with many new lifts and trails set to open for the 2025/2026 winter season.
Map showing current and expanded terrain at Deer Valley Resort.
The built-out resort will have 37 lifts (it now has 21), more lifts than any other North American ski resort except for neighboring Park City Mountain Resort, which has 41. It will also go from 103 ski runs to 238 runs. When completed, Deer Valley will expand from 2,206 skiable acres to 5,726 acres of ski-only terrain spread across 10 mountains.
The ambitious Mayflower project, which included hotels, condos, retail, and restaurants, will now be part of the expanded Deer Valley. The new village will have over 800 hotel rooms spread across multiple properties, close to 1,700 residential units, 250,000 square feet of retail and commercial space, and 68,000 square feet for a recreation center.
Access to the new village will be directly off U.S. Highway 40, which means that getting to Deer Valley from Salt Lake City will not require driving through Park City, which has become more congested with the growth of both Deer Valley and Park City Mountain Resort in the past few years.
The Park City area was already a world-class destination resort, but the Deer Valley expansion will put it into another luxury league. With Salt Lake City International Airport just 45 minutes away, it is also more accessible than rivals such as Vail/Beaver Creek and Whistler.
