How Reno's oldest trailer park turned into a tiny 'resort' community on the Truckee

When Kari Galgon and her husband Manfred first considered buying the Chism Trailer Park west of downtown Reno, Manfred told her, "I don't want to own a junkyard."

But Kari saw something in the dilapidated trailers and "questionable tenants" on Second Street and Keystone Avenue.

She told Manfred to turn around, close his eyes and think about the scenery: the 600 trees on the property, the Truckee River running behind it.

"Think of it as an upscale property," she told him. "Now turn around and tell me it's a no and I’ll walk away."

It would take a lot of work and investment to revive the 88-year-old trailer park into something livable, but Kari figured they'd never shied away from hard work before, so why stop now.

Three years later, the renamed River West Resort is a safe, supportive community of new and old tenants.

Some live in vintage trailers with midcentury built-in furniture, green and yellow fixtures and thin wood walls. Others live in state-of-the art trailers and RVs with multiple air conditioning units, granite countertops and modern appliances. And some live in 220-square-foot tiny houses on wheels with lofted beds atop the bathroom and kitchen-office-living room combos.

Every once in a while, an Airstream made of shiny rounded aluminum backs into a spot and you'll wonder if it's original or new.

Kari Galgon spent the past three years converting Reno's first auto camp into a tightly connected community. The first year and a half was the hardest.

Starting around the 1920s, when car travel was becoming all the rage and interstates hadn't been invented yet, people took summer road trips on state highways that passed through small towns like Reno. People pulled up to auto camps where they could park in front of a cabin and sleep for the night, then leave again in the morning.

Auto camps pre-dated motor lodges, which later gave way to motels, then hotels with more and more amenities. Auto camps were simple, sometimes they included a kitchen or group bathrooms, but not always.

Harry Chism opened the Chism Auto Camp on West Second Street in 1927, the same year the Transcontinental Highway Exposition connected East and West and gave Reno its first arch, according to RenoHistorical.org. At the time, Second Street was an alternate to the Lincoln Highway (aka Highway 40, now Fourth Street) because it gave people a drive along the Truckee River.

More: How Reno ended up with 3.1 arches in 90 years

The auto camp attracted travelers but also people looking for residency so they could get a divorce. The Chism family later added travel trailer spaces, according to RenoHistorical.

In "The Long, Long Trailer" in 1954, Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz hauled a 40-foot trailer over the unfinished roads of Sierra Nevada Mountains on their way to Colorado. All the hijinks and chaos were not unfamiliar to new travelers at the time.

By the 1990s and 2000s, trailer parks started to turn ugly, the Chism park included. It became a home for drug trafficking and people escaping the law.

"When we first moved here, we weren't sure this was the park for us," said Donna Austin, now the night manager for River West Resort. Austin and her husband lived at the resort before the Galgons took over.

"Police were here a lot. A lot of sketchy people lived here," she said. "I'm not into the drug scene and the getting-stuff-stolen scene."

Austin said the riverfront used to be littered with needles and people camping illegally, too. But they stayed because the other RV and trailer parks around Reno were even worse.

When the Galgons showed up in 2015, all of that changed. Austin said she feels safe now.

"I'm a glam-lord not a slumlord," Galgon said.

"I’ve been really dirt poor before and couldn’t afford heat, but I always thought, 'We don’t have to live like that,'" Galgon said. "People don’t have to live with trash piled up, and people don’t always see it. And I like helping people to see that they can live beautifully."

That was her impetus for sticking with the park through all of the hard times, kicking out bad and dangerous tenants and finding out that every piece of infrastructure needed to be replaced.

The Galgons spent millions of dollars buying the property and replacing infrastructure so it could handle the high demands of modern RV and trailer life.

It took until about 2017 to see park life change for the better. Galgon hauled several ruined trailers to the dump and restored others that deserved to be saved. Every time someone vacated a lot, Galgon dug up the ground and replaced the clay sewer pipes with new ones.

Soon she will have to replace all of the power poles, transformers and power lines to support RVs with high electrical demands. Some people need to be careful running all three air conditioners, two TVs and a microwave, she joked.

But all of that work paid off last Thanksgiving when the residents threw an outdoor potluck party. People cooked, helped disabled residents across the park and had a great time. They couldn't stop raving about it eight months later.

That showed Galgon that she had built a community that supports each other and helps each other live better lives.

"The value of this kind of project has been the people, the community," Galgon said. "No one is on their phone. They all talk to each other. That kind of community doesn't exist in America anymore."

A community like that doesn't just come out of nowhere though; there's a little bit of social engineering involved.

River West Resort hosts 151 families who rent spaces starting at $750 then either put their own trailer or RV on the spot or rent one of the Galgons' trailers. River West Resort is one of the more expensive trailer parks in town because they offer larger spaces, utilities, laundry and a bathhouse.

But it's also more affordable than most apartments in town.

The rental managers conduct background checks before renting out a space. They tell interested renters not to bother paying the application fee if they've been arrested before, because they won't rent to people with a criminal history.

The resort also rents out 26 overnight spaces to travelers, which are in high demand during Hot August Nights and Street Vibrations. Those people get checked, too.

Now the only time police visit the park is to check trailer VIN numbers and update DMV records instead of for domestic disputes, Austin said. Not like in the old days.

Galgon and her staff also use one more trick to build their community. They interview new tenants to understand their personality, then place them near other residents who they might get along with. Sometimes they mix it up though to draw people out of their shells.

"People keep each other accountable," Galgon said.

Donna Austin and her husband raised their family in Wisconsin. When they retired, Austin said, their children wanted them to continue working — taking care of them. Well, that's not what retirement is all about, she said.

They sold everything and moved out of their 3,000-square-foot house, bought a trailer online and started heading west. Anything that didn't fit in the Ford Expedition got left behind.

They picked up the trailer and drove to Winnemucca, but the park there was overwhelmed with gold miners and couldn't accommodate them. So, they kept driving.

"I guess we're going to Reno," she said, like so many others who end up here.

Many of the residents tell similar stories. They lived in big houses and then one day they were just done with that life and needed a change.

"I turned in my work iPad, my work truck keys, left my two jobs, bought this trailer and came down here to work for Shambaugh," said David Townsend.

Townsend and his wife Devon live in a 43-foot modern trailer with all the bells and whistles. On a nice day in spring, Devon's mother helped them plant a garden.

The Townsends still own the large house on 165 acres in Idaho but rarely go back to visit. David works for Shambaugh and Sons industrial fire protection contractors. Devon is in the U.S. Air Force and commutes to Tacoma, Washington once a month.

David said he likes working where he's not in charge anymore. And he needed a change of scenery. Living on the river helps.

Blair Zika similarly needed a change in her life. She worked for Apple in Reno and traveled regularly. A few years ago, her husband died unexpectedly. For a while she still lived in their house, but it was a constant reminder of what happened.

"Apple is a beautiful company, but it was always hard taking the route home where I found out about my husband," Zika said.

So she donated and sold everything, bought a tiny house on wheels and moved to the trailer park to live in 220 square feet. Her mother joined her and lives next door in another tiny house.

Zika likes the freedom and flexibility of the park and the close community of support. At the end of May she sold the tiny house so that she could fit her life into a backpack and go on a spiritual journey through central Asia.

She said she probably won't return to Reno.

Galgon said these residents are typical. Tesla employees, retired people, people looking for change and support all move through the park. Most of them lived in traditional, large houses and decide they wanted freedom from "stuff" and wanted to live near Reno's natural beauty.

Some people have lived in the park for more than 20 years and some just moved in yesterday.

"People come and go, but they always come back," Galgon said.

She works seven days a week dealing with residents, conflicts and maintenance, but she said it's worth all that energy and money for people like "Old Man Jim," "Hippy Nevada," and even "Junkyard Johnny."

Because it's like building a family.

"Sometimes you yell at them, but you like 'em," Austin told Galgon.

"If I don't yell at you, it's because I don't like you," Galgon responded.

Mike Higdon is the city life reporter at the RGJ and can be found on Instagram @MillennialMike, on Facebook at Mike Higdon, Reno Life and on Twitter @MikeHigdon.