Fernley, NV

As a rule of time and consequence, people tend to come and go, businesses have their day, and most certainly, technology has its ups and downs. But towns seem to endure and, with an occasional tweak or two, remain intact—riding the tides of change like a well-anchored ship.

Fernley, Nev., (pop. 10,235) is such a place—a quiet town devoted to ranching and farming. It’s shady cottonwood-lined streets are a relief in the summertime and a shimmer of gold in the fall. On hot summer days, the thick aroma of fresh alfalfa still blankets its back roads.

But little Fernley is in flux. As the exodus from larger cities advances, people are flocking to Nevada and towns like Fernley. Besides the population increase, there’s something else growing here, and it’s not just alfalfa.

In the mid-1990s, high-tech companies began to see the benefits of relocating at least part of their operations to northern Nevada. “At the crossroads of Nevada,” is Fernley’s motto, and it fits. With its location on Interstate 80—a major east-west corridor—the area is close to major shipping points on the West Coast and offers excellent tax incentives to companies doing business in the Silver State.

One of the first companies to move its major operation to Nevada was Amazon.com. The on-line bookstore giant chose the sleepy town of Fernley to build its warehouse. Overnight, Fernley went from a small agricultural community to riding the dot.com roller coaster.

Fernley is the perfect choice for a large warehousing operation. Thousands of packages can be shipped every day by truck or rail. Land for development is inexpensive around Fernley, and the area has a ready base of workers anxious to work closer to home. Recently, Amazon.com’s Fernley warehouse took on even more of the company’s shipping load, making it an even bigger operation. Amazon also has offered existing employees the opportunity to relocate to Fernley. And the growth continues. Several other large corporations also have moved into Fernley’s industrial parks.

“Fernley gives families opportunities that a lot of small towns don’t,” says Boyd Franklin, president of the local Chamber of Commerce and a Fernley resident since 1996. “You can live where you work, and there are opportunities for children as they grow up; they don’t have to leave. Now, we’d like to get a community college and tech center satellite sites here.” The Nevada Legislature plans to look at funding for both in its current session.

But the new growth is changing Fernley. Housing developments are increasing; agricultural land is decreasing. Last year, in an attempt to avoid the lighting and landscaping problems experienced by cities like Reno and Sparks, Town Manager Gary Bacock went to work establishing guidelines for new construction. Developers are asked to install more efficient street lights, specifically fixtures that focus lighting downward instead of up into the night sky.

“This concept is being pursued to address the issue now,” Bacock maintains. “No one has been non-receptive to the lighting issue. I think the developers are embracing it. As far as I’m concerned, it’s been very successful.”

A town board has governed Fernley since the 1980s, with residents only recently voting to incorporate. “We have the opportunity to manage our own growth,” Franklin says.

An updated master plan for the community projects the population could reach 35,000 in the next 20 years.

“The old master plan didn’t resemble what was actually happening,” says Bacock “We held lots and lots of public meetings and have been working on it for two years. We tried to balance the needs of everybody.”

“Fernley is a desirable place to live,” Franklin adds. “It’s only going to get better.”

In these fluctuating times, you never know where the Internet is going next. But the little town that went dot.com just could become a future model for small towns elsewhere, absorbing change and going on.

Sherril Steel-Carlin is a freelance writer from Reno, Nev.

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