Fairview Canyon • One by one one, skiers and snowboarders grabbed onto the smooth blue rope that serves as the only lift at Utah’s newest ski area. And one by one, they flopped like fish into the river of smoothly groomed snow. Then, they’d get up and grab hold again, their only alternative being to hike the 500 vertical feet to the top.
Figuring out the best technique took some trial and error. After a few attempts, though, most got the hang of it.
The Snowland Recreation and Education Area — which has at times on its website been called the Snowland Ski & Tubing Resort — also had a few issues to work out on its opening day Saturday. Not the least of them was that this season it is not allowing tubing.
Yet, like the tricky tow rope, it showed it could serve its purpose and then some by creating both a community hub and an unpretentious place to learn to ski or snowboard.
“It’s the best of both worlds,” said Chad McKay of Ephraim, whose family had been driving the two hours to Park City Mountain to go skiing and snowboarding.
(Bethany Baker | The Salt Lake Tribune) Two kids walk up the mountain with a sled near the Snowland Recreation and Education Area in Fairview Canyon. The community ski hill opened its lone rope tow to the public on Saturday, Jan. 17, 2026. It is not allowing sledding on its runs, but tubing lanes are expected to be installed next winter.
Both McKay and his wife both learned to snowboard at Snowland, but the experience three of their sons had at the ski hill Saturday — letting the blue rope pull them to the top in a matter of minutes — was considerably different from their own.
When McKay was a teenager, his dad’s old, green GMC pickup was his lift. He and three or four buddies would clear out the rakes and sprinklers his dad used in his landscaping business and pack into the bed. Then McKay’s dad would drive them to the top of Fairview Canyon, where they’d clamber out, hike to the meadow and ride back down to the highway. His dad’s truck would be waiting there, ready to take them up again.
It was a time-honored tradition, but not the safest of activities. All the vehicles making U-turns on the winding mountain road and the kids careening in sleds and skis toward the busy highway concerned some locals. That became the impetus behind the formation last year of the nonprofit Snowland Foundation, Inc. Its mission is to revive the ski area, which had been public from 1967 to 1980 before insurance costs and permitting challenges forced its closure.
Months of work, $1 million in state funding plus more than $400,000 in matching funds and a little snow later, Snowland welcomed its first public visitors in four decades Saturday.
Some wore jeans and work boots still coated in manure. Others were bedecked in reflective goggles and high-tech jackets.
Jacob Wang, 22, of Saratoga Springs appeared to fit somewhere in between. He said he’s been snowboarding since he was 4 but only goes once or twice a season because of the cost and distance. When he heard Snowland was run by a nonprofit, he made it his mission to be there when it opened.
“Finally,” he said, “a non-greedy ski resort.”
(Bethany Baker | The Salt Lake Tribune) Skiers hit the slopes as Snowland Recreation and Education Area opens its lone rope tow to the public in Fairfview on Saturday, Jan. 17, 2026.
The nonprofit has promised that lift tickets will be free this season. However, they must be reserved online. Just 50 tickets were released for opening day, and they were snapped up within an hour of their release Tuesday.
That didn’t keep about 350 people from showing up anyway.
Many of them came to sled, an activity that is not condoned at Snowland this winter. Potentially as soon as next winter, however, the nonprofit plans to add a tubing operation with four to six lanes and a magic carpet lift. It also has plans — and a state grant worth $1.46 million — to install a roughly 2,475-foot T-bar lift that would connect the two sections of State Route 31 that historically make up the turnaround points for drivers like McKay’s dad.
Visitors should expect to pay a nominal amount for use of the lifts once those amenities are added, said Brent Lange, chairperson of the Snowland nonprofit.
Lange said he hated turning people away Saturday. Still, he felt it was important in order to keep the tiny ski area — which has just four runs over 25 acres with an 18-inch base — from being overrun. Snowland, which has no snowmaking, is scheduled to be open Saturdays and holidays through February.
“I think those who came prepared with a reservation had a great experience,” said Lange, who gave Snowland a “B” grade on opening day. “I think those who didn’t were a little frustrated. … So, we’ll have to work that out.”
After evaluating Saturday’s crowd, the daily ticket limit has been raised to 70. Another change reflected on Snowland’s website Saturday evening is the recommendation that skiers and snowboarders wear leather gloves or rubber coated work gloves. Several visitors lamented that their synthetic gloves tore, or that they simply couldn’t grip the tow rope.
(Bethany Baker | The Salt Lake Tribune) Chad McKay sheperds his 5-year-old son, Calvin, up the rope tow as the Snowland Recreation and Education Area opens its lone lift to the public in Fairfview on Saturday, Jan. 17, 2026. McKay learned to snowboard on the hill as a teenager, before the lift was installed.
McKay, who didn’t have to shuttle his sons up the mountain in his truck but did have to shepherd his 5-year-old between his legs up the tow rope, agreed that the lift isn’t ideal. Still, he’s enjoying skiing with his kids rather than waiting for them in his truck on the side of the road.
“I thought it was a good start for a new resort,” he said, “and I’m excited to see how it’ll grow and change over the next few years.”