Canyon transit Cottonwood Heights
Four routes, five lots, and one counter intuitive rule about which lot to use
The ski bus and the park and rides.
Four UTA services climb the two Cottonwood canyons in winter and one of them is published as starting in Cottonwood Heights. Which route you can use decides whether a half day is possible, which lot you aim at decides whether you get a space, and a pass a lot of households already hold makes the fare disappear. Here is how it actually works from this bench.
Southern Utah is my home turf. Cottonwood Heights is not, so these pages are researched rather than lived: checked against city, county and venue sources, and dated so you can see how fresh they are. For the on-the-ground work here I lean on a Salt Lake County partner agent.
Start here
One of the canyon routes is published as starting in this city.
Four UTA services run up the two Cottonwood canyons in winter and they do not all do the same job. Route CS2 is published as Cottonwood Heights to Alta Ski Area, running continuously every 30 minutes from 6:00 in the morning until 7:30 in the evening, daily. Route CS1 covers the same canyon from Midvale Fort Union Station but only at the ends of the day, mornings from 6:00 to 8:30 and evenings from 5:00 to 7:30. Route 994 runs Historic Sandy Station to Alta by way of Snowbird, every 30 minutes from 6:00 to 7:00. Route 972 is the Big Cottonwood service to Solitude and Brighton.
For a household on this bench that difference between an all day service and a commuter shaped one is the whole decision. An all day route means you can come down at two in the afternoon because the light went flat, which is exactly the kind of half day a fifteen minute address makes possible. A morning and evening route means committing to a full day before you leave the house.
The money is simple and it is the part people get wrong in the other direction. A one way trip is 5 dollars, or 2 dollars 50 for qualified reduced fare riders, and it is free with an Alta, Snowbird, Solitude or Brighton season pass, an Ikon pass or the Salt Lake Ski Super Pass. If somebody in the household already holds one of those, the bus costs nothing and the car stays on the driveway.
The canyon services, in four numbers
CS2
the route published as starting here
30 min
the interval on the all day services
5 dollars
a one way trip, or free on several passes
8:30 am
when the lots nearest the canyons are full
The lots
The one nearest the canyon is the wrong one to aim at.
This is the single most useful thing on the page and it is counter intuitive. UDOT says plainly that the park and ride lots closest to the canyons are full by half past eight on most days. The lots further down the valley are the ones with capacity, and they are also where the early buses actually start.
| The lot | Where it is | What runs from it | Why it matters here |
|---|---|---|---|
| Big Cottonwood Canyon Park and Ride | At the canyon mouth, inside the city | Route 972 to Solitude and Brighton | Closest to most of this city, and the first to fill |
| 6200 South and Wasatch Boulevard | On the bench road at the city's northern end | Canyon service, and the earliest Big Cottonwood departures | The practical alternative when the mouth lot is gone |
| Midvale Fort Union Station | 7250 South 180 West, down the boulevard | Route 972 from 6:15, and route CS1 | Where route 972 actually begins its day |
| Historic Sandy Station | 9000 South 165 East | Route 994 to Snowbird and Alta | The Little Cottonwood service, for the southern end of the bench |
| 9400 South 2000 East | Near the Little Cottonwood gate | Little Cottonwood service | Also published as 9400 South Highland Drive; check the current stop |
Stops and lot assignments move between seasons and this table is the state of the published information on 7 August 2026. Before a first trip, take the current route map from UTA and the current lot list from UDOT's Cottonwood Canyons pages, because a lot that served a route last winter may not this one.
Route 972 does not reach the canyon mouth lot until 8:10. That is the trap for anybody who assumes the nearest lot is the earliest option. Big Cottonwood service starts at 6:15 in the morning from Midvale Fort Union Station and works its way up, and its earliest stop at the Big Cottonwood Canyon Park and Ride is 8:10. So the lot closest to the canyon is both the first to fill and among the last to be served. If the plan is a first chair morning, the plan starts further down the valley.
The resident version
The bus is not a fallback here. For a lot of households it is the default.
A visitor rides the ski bus because parking is difficult. Somebody who lives on this bench rides it for a different reason: it removes the vehicle from the equation entirely, and with it the tyres, the reservation, the lot, the walk from the lot and the drive home in the dark at the end of a long day. When the fare is already covered by a pass that the household holds anyway, the bus stops being a compromise and becomes the obvious way to get up the hill.
The other thing proximity buys is the drop off. A household with two adults and one skier in it can put somebody on a bus at a lot five minutes from the house and go back to the morning, which is a completely different operation from parking a car at a resort for eight hours. It is also the only version of a ski morning that works when there is a second child with a Saturday fixture in the valley.
The timings reward the same midweek thinking the resorts do. UDOT's published quiet window for the canyons is Tuesday to Thursday between 11:00 and 3:00, which is precisely the shape an all day, every 30 minutes service supports and a morning only one does not. A half day starting at eleven and finishing at three is a real thing to do from here, and almost nobody visiting the state can do it.
What the bus does not do is exempt anybody from the road. When the canyon is closed for control work the bus is closed with it, and the requirements that apply to a private vehicle on those two roads are a separate subject with its own reader. All of that sits on the canyon winter access page, which is the one to read in November rather than in January.
When the fare is already inside a pass the household holds, the bus is not the cheap option. It is the easy one.
Being honest about it
Four things the bus does not fix.
It does not run all year. These are winter services with published season dates, and outside them there is no scheduled transit up either canyon at all. Every summer trailhead, every wildflower morning and every autumn drive over the ridge is a private vehicle proposition, which is why the trailhead parking question in this city is a summer problem and the queue is a winter one.
It does not serve every resort from every lot. The Little Cottonwood services and the Big Cottonwood service start from different places, and the lot that is closest to your house may only serve the canyon you are not going to that day. That is worth working out once, in October, rather than discovering it at 6:15 on a Saturday with skis in the boot.
It does not make the road open. A closure for avalanche control closes the canyon to everything, and a bus in a queue is still in the queue. The advantage on a heavy morning is not speed; it is that somebody else is driving, the vehicle is rated for the conditions, and there is no parking problem at the far end.
And it does not help with a dog, because a dog cannot go up either of these canyons at all. That rule is the watershed ordinance rather than a transit rule, and the alternative on this side of the ridge is Ferguson Canyon, which is walkable from a good part of the city and allows a leashed dog.
There is no scheduled transit up either canyon outside the winter season. Summer is a car and a parking space.
Keep reading
More of Cottonwood Heights on The Local.
Things to do
The top 6, ranked
A festival that left Pioneer Day, an Olympic sheet of ice, and a mill facing demolition.
Read the guideThe home canyon
Big Cottonwood from the doorstep
What a season of Brighton mornings is like when the gate is at the end of your street.
Read the guideThe corridor
Fort Union, the fort and the road
A militia fort from 1853, a boulevard through three cities, and what stands on it now.
Read the guideThe city's canyon
Ferguson Canyon
The city's own canyon, where a leashed dog is legal and the street parking is not.
Read the guideMoving here
Living at the mouth
Winter tyres as standing equipment, a separate recreation tax, and two land use fights.
Read the guideThe companion
Cottonwood Heights, the whole picture
Two canyon gates, a boulevard, a bus route, the city's own canyon and the homework, together.
Read the pageQuick answers
The bus, answered.
Yes. Route CS2 is published as running Cottonwood Heights to Alta Ski Area, continuously every 30 minutes from 6:00 in the morning until 7:30 in the evening, daily. Route CS1 covers the same canyon from Midvale Fort Union Station at the ends of the day only, route 994 runs from Historic Sandy Station to Alta via Snowbird, and route 972 is the Big Cottonwood service to Solitude and Brighton. Confirm the current routes with UTA.
Five dollars for a one way trip, or 2 dollars 50 for qualified reduced fare riders. It is free with an Alta, Snowbird, Solitude or Brighton season pass, an Ikon pass or the Salt Lake Ski Super Pass. That last point is the one people miss: if somebody in the household already holds one of those passes, the bus costs them nothing and the car can stay on the driveway all season.
Not the one at the canyon mouth, if you want a space and an early start. UDOT states that the park and ride lots closest to the canyons are full by 8:30 in the morning on most days, and route 972 does not make its earliest stop at the Big Cottonwood Canyon Park and Ride until 8:10. Route 972 begins its day at 6:15 from Midvale Fort Union Station at 7250 South 180 West, which is where an early plan should start.
The earliest published departures are at 6:00 in the morning on the Little Cottonwood services and 6:15 from Midvale Fort Union Station on the Big Cottonwood service. The all day routes then run continuously at 30 minute intervals, CS2 until 7:30 in the evening and route 994 until 7:00. Route CS1 is different in shape, running mornings from 6:00 to 8:30 and evenings from 5:00 to 7:30 rather than through the day.
Alta publishes route 994 as running from 5 December to 12 April, and routes CS1 and CS2 from 7 December to 12 April. Those dates are set each year and they are not the same across routes, so take the current season from UTA. Outside the winter season there is no scheduled transit up either Cottonwood canyon at all, which is why every summer trailhead trip from this city is a private vehicle proposition.
At the Goldminer's Daughter Lodge, which is the practical drop for Alta and, with the connection between the two, for Snowbird as well. The canyon services terminate there rather than circulating through the town. Because these are winter services on a road that closes for avalanche control, the return timing on a heavy day is a function of the road rather than the timetable, and the last published departure is the one to note before you go up.
For most households on this bench it is the easy option rather than the cheap one. It removes the vehicle from the day entirely, which means no tyres, no reservation, no lot and no drive home in the dark, and if a pass in the household already covers the fare it costs nothing. It also allows a drop off five minutes from the house, which is a different operation from parking a car at a resort for eight hours.
It would not help if you could, because dogs are prohibited in both Cottonwood canyons entirely under the watershed ordinance that protects the valley's drinking water, including a dog that never leaves a vehicle. That is a canyon rule rather than a transit rule. For a walk with a leashed dog from a Cottonwood Heights address, Ferguson Canyon on this side of the ridge is the answer, and it has its own page on this companion.
No. When a Cottonwood canyon road closes for avalanche control it closes to everything, buses included, and a bus sitting in a queue is still in the queue. What the bus removes is the parking problem, the tyre requirement and the drive, not the road. The requirements that govern those roads in winter, and what a closure actually involves, are covered on the canyon winter access page for the county.
A bus route starts here, and that is worth more than it sounds.
It is also one of the few genuinely measurable differences between addresses on this bench, along with which gate you sit behind and how far you are from a lot that still has space at eight in the morning. Tell me the streets you are weighing and I will put a Salt Lake County partner agent on the ground work while I take the paperwork and the lending side.
Referral disclosure. Outside Southern Utah, I connect home sellers and buyers with partner agents I trust in their area. If you choose to work with an agent I refer, that agent's brokerage pays my brokerage (Real Broker, LLC) a referral fee. The fee comes out of the agent's compensation; it is not an added cost to you. You are always free to choose any agent you wish, and using a referred agent is never required.