A friend of mine who has far too much time on his hands since retiring, recently became alarmed that East Village is now part of the 84060 ZIP code.
What has the world come to? Your next question was, “What’s East Village?” For those who missed it, or understandably immediately forgot, “East Village” is “What Makes Exit 8 Great.”
You probably know it as Mayflower, Deer Valley’s expansion. The Mayflower name has been associated with the major mine in that area since the 1870s, so it’s been around for 150 years.
As the new development has launched there, the Mayflower name, despite its long history, seemed out of place in the wilds of Utah. It conjured up images of dour pilgrims at Plymouth Rock, enjoying a nice apres ski fondue with the native population just before exterminating them. Just not a good fit without some context. So they called in the branding experts to select a new name for this multi-billion dollar project.
There were a lot of options. There was a rail station at the mine called Cranmer, and also the now-inundated town of Keetley. It’s located in Pocatello Gulch and Big Dutch Pete Hollow. None of those sound like neighborhoods of $20 million houses.
The development has a view of the reservoir, so all the lakeside names might have suggested some options. A truck stop in Iowa had already trademarked “Exit 8,” so that was out. “East Village” became the obvious choice. It manages to say so little and yet so much.
While the name lacks pizazz, they managed to get reassigned to a sizzling ZIP code. My friend was absolutely livid that the one true ZIP code, the prized 060, from the real Park City, had somehow been co-opted by the development formerly known as Mayflower, or DFKM. How could such a thing be allowed?
ZIP codes are assigned by the Post Office through a process more secretive than the Scottish Rite. It’s based on the Post Office where the letter carrier picks up his load for the swift completion of his appointed rounds.
For decades, there was not much to deliver at DFKM. Since the mines closed and Keetley drowned, there hasn’t been anybody there. The mail, if any, got dispatched from the Heber Post Office, since it is in Wasatch County.
Suddenly, there are swarms of people around Jordanelle, and the Post Office had to figure out to deliver the Gorsuch catalog to the right part of them. The east side of the lake is all in the Kamas ZIP code — the 036 — though nobody in Kamas would say that Hideout or Tuhaye are part of the Kamas community.
Just to confuse things, the kids who live there go to school in Heber, and their parents think they live in Park City. When it comes to Hideout, there truly is no “there” there.
The west side of the lake had been in the Heber ZIP code, with the exception of Deer Crest, which is 30 years older and was added to the 060 without controversy. But Kamas and Heber are overwhelmed with new growth, and couldn’t handle the additional deliveries in DFKM.
So deep in the bowels of the U.S. Postal Service, somebody redrew the lines and East Village is now part of the 060, at least as far as the mailman is concerned.
Does it make a difference? Well, if you are selling real estate there, having a Park City address is maybe worth 15% on price. At minimum it removes a potential barrier when talking to buyers who might say they aren’t sure they want a multimillion dollar vacation home in Heber, even though it’s the same house.
We went through this years ago with the Kimball Junction Post Office. People were really upset at the prospects of being displaced from Park City to Snyderville, at least in terms of addresses. In the end, the 098 became a second ZIP code for Park City without changing the town name. Insurrection averted.
The boundaries of the expanded 060 are interesting. They follow the boundaries of the MIDA funding district, so SkyRidge (formerly Sage Hen Hollow, but they have joined the Mohicans now) made the cut. The Mason, a condo development at Exit 8 is, oh, so close, but still has the Heber ZIP code. The shoreline of the reservoir would have been a pretty logical boundary, but it curiously follows the MIDA boundary instead.
We’ll never know what influence was brought to bear on the Post Office bureaucracy to make the change, but somebody asked for it, suggested the boundaries, and made a deliberate decision about who entered the promised land of 060, and who remained wandering in the wilderness with Kamas or Heber addresses, despite not being near either one.
It’s important to remember that ZIP codes are a function of the Postal Service. It has nothing to do with local government jurisdiction. Having an 060 mailing address doesn’t mean East Villagers can vote in either Park City or Summit County elections. It’s still in Wasatch County for local government functions, and nobody gets to vote for the MIDA board.
Not that anybody uses a landline anymore, but the Mayflower area is served by the Kamas phone company. You can rest assured that people in the expanded 060 won’t start showing up with a prized 649 phone number. We have to draw the line somewhere.
Tom Clyde practiced law in Park City for many years. He lives on a working ranch in Woodland and has been writing this column since 1986.