You can feel the vibe all over town as the holidays in Park City draw near. Now, we just need Mother Nature to cooperate! As we celebrate with friends and loved ones, we’re also excited about the year ahead in 2025 (the topic of my next column). But first, let’s salute 2024, a year spotlighting Park City as never before.Being part of the united Utah effort that landed the 2034 Olympic and Paralympic Games was exhilarating. The announcement in Paris is a moment I will never forget. The energy and anticipation ahead of the Games, much like the impact of our 2024 Mountainkind rebrand, will continue to grow in the years ahead.Mountainkind is one word that captures our essence, memorably communicates our connection to community and each other, and speaks to our commitment to environmental stewardship and the mountain life we are so blessed to enjoy. Our successful Mountainkind holiday eGift Card and the “Mountainkind Morning” celebration last week was a perfect way to kick off the season — thanking our hard-working employees and our residents.This year, the chamber crossed the 1,000-partner threshold for the first time (we currently count 1,075 members), an achievement we attribute in part to our dedication to serving our members and community. We expanded our Employee Benefits Program, offering access to quality health coverage for chamber partners, workers, and their families, even if they have as few as two employees. We also relaunched the innovative WERIP program and our Slopeside Village partnership, incentivizing landlords to rent to workers of chamber partners offering discounted rates and reduced fees.As the Sundance Film Festival considers a new host after 2027, collaboration with our many excellent regional partners helped Park City and Salt Lake make the finals with a unique blend of urban vibrancy and natural beauty — a genuine team effort.This year, for the first time, we put some real-world numbers on the impact of tourism, which drives our region’s prosperity. The result of the Tourism Economic Impact Study by Tourism Economics, an Oxford Economics Company, revealed an astonishing top-line number: Tourism has an annual local economic impact of $2.2 billion. Almost 15,000 local jobs are tied directly to tourism, producing $818 million in annual wages, and tourism adds $242 million annually to government coffers, covering the costs of our free public transit and many other services.There were many more highlights this year, such as November’s Tourism Fall Forum and September’s Annual Meeting — both sellouts — another energizing July Fourth BBQ at the Oakley Rodeo (with a visit from Gov. Spencer Cox), improvements at our Kimball Junction Visitor Information Center, the debut of our Stories app, which allows self-guided tours of Park City historic sites, and our Mountain IDEAL certification, validating our sustainability leadership based on more than 170 Global Sustainable Tourism Council criteria.But what I will remember most about 2024 is the hundreds of bright, far-seeing, energetic and skillful people I encounter each day! Your kindness and love of Park City is shaping a Mountainkind community whose most colorful, most successful years lie ahead. Happy holidays to all!Jennifer Wesselhoff is the president and CEO of the Park City Chamber of Commerce & Visitors Bureau.The post Park City Pulse: City shined in 2024 with Olympics win, Mountainkind appeared first on Park Record.