Staff reports Jan 20, 2022
Prince William already has one of the largest concentrations of data centers in Virginia. The huge, windowless, box-shaped buildings house computer systems critical for running the internet. These data centers photographed here are along Va. 234 in the Manassas area.
photo by Roger Snyder
A community meeting about the potential expansion of Prince William County’s Data Center Opportunity Zone Overlay District will be held virtually tonight, Thursday, Jan. 20, due to winter weather. All in-person activities related to the meeting are canceled.
The meeting will still begin at 6:30 p.m. It will be livestreamed on the county’s website and recorded. A link to watch the event live will be posted on the county’s project page: www.pwcva.gov/datacenteroverlay.
The meeting was initially planned for the Beacon Hall Conference Center at George Mason University’s Manassas campus.
Prince William County supervisors directed county staff in May to re-examine the county’s Data Center Opportunity Zone Overlay District for a potential expansion.
The county’s existing district encompasses around 10,000 acres, mostly in western Prince William County, where data center construction is allowed by right. The expansion is being considered because land suitable for future data centers within the existing district is running out, according to Prince William County Department of Economic Development Director Christina Winn and other officials.
The county has not yet released a draft of a proposed new map of the data center overlay district.
Another community meeting will be held next Thursday, Jan. 27 on the “PW Digital Gateway,” a proposed comprehensive plan amendment that could allow data centers to be built on 2,133 acres near Manassas National Battlefield Park and Conway national forest in western Prince William County.
The property is currently zoned agricultural or “A1” — a designation for agricultural and residential development – and is part of the county’s “rural crescent,” where development is generally limited to one home per 10 acres and where access to public sewer lines is restricted. Those stipulations have previously prevented industrial uses, such as data centers, from locating in the rural crescent.
The meeting on the “PW Digital Gateway” proposal is still planned to be held in-person at 6 p.m. on Thursday, Jan. 27 at the Beacon Hall Conference Center at the George Mason University campus in Manassas.