The Park City area played an outsized role in the 2002 Winter Olympics with three major competition venues and a Games-long celebration along Main Street.

The community may play an even larger role in a future Winter Olympics.

An International Olympic Committee member with an important role in the selection of host cities for future Winter Olympics and Summer Olympics briefly spoke last weekend about possibilities for Park City if the state is awarded a second Games. Karl Stoss, the chair of the Future Host Commission of the IOC, was part of a delegation from the Lausanne, Switzerland-based organization that visited Utah to learn about the bid for a Games.

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“I think the role will be much stronger for Park City . . . Because to bring more sportsmen and women to Park City to use all of these venues in a good way, and I think this is the way we have to do it. Not just for the elite. We have to do it for the community. And you have excellent, excellent preparations for that,” Stoss said in an interview at the close of the four-day visit last week.

He did not provide details, but the comment seems to support the idea that the Park City area could be especially integral to the overall blueprints of a Games. That was the case during the 2002 Winter Olympics and there have been indications there are even more local possibilities in a second Games.

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Park City Mountain, Deer Valley Resort and the Utah Olympic Park have been identified as competition venues after each of them hosted athletes in 2002. The Salt Lake City-Utah Committee for the Games has detailed a proposed venue map outlining the disciplines that would be held at each of the locations. An ultimate competition grid would be key to the wider planning of a Games since the times and locations of the sporting events would influence the rest of the preparations.

Stoss said the IOC delegation was unable to spend extensive time in the Park City area as a result of scheduling constraints. He noted the continued use of the venues that hosted competitions in 2002.

“We saw just a little bit because the time was too short. But we saw it at the venues — the small children starting this jumping. That’s incredible to see. How important is it to bring the families together at such a beautiful venue?” he said.

Stoss also addressed the years of work required before the opening of a Winter Olympics, saying international competitions could be held in the Park City area in the years prior to a Games.

“Great venues. And we have to try to bring more world competitions back to Park City. That means in skiing, or in bob, in luge, in skeleton. So we have all the opportunities at one place,” he said.

Stoss said talks would be needed with the various winter-sports federations since they set their own competition calendars. He said, “changes are not so quick, so we have to think in the long range.”

“If we now decided to bring back the Olympic Games to Park City, for example, there will be more competitions in preparation (of) the athletes for the great moment in the Olympic Games,” he said.

The full IOC is expected to award the 2034 Winter Olympics to Salt Lake City during meetings this summer on the eve of the Summer Olympics in Paris.

The Future Host Commission during the visit broadly praised the concept for a Games crafted by the Salt Lake City-Utah Committee for the Games. The IOC delegation’s trip included stops at Park City Mountain, Deer Valley and the Utah Olympic Park.