Temporary Data Center Moratorium
Moratorium Background
On January 13, 2026, the Common Council voted to approve a temporary moratorium on issuing zoning approvals for new data centers with a floor area larger than 10,000 square feet. The moratorium may last up to one year and only applies to data centers that are the principal or primary use of the property.
Right now, Madison's zoning code does not include a definition or any specific standards or regulations for "data centers." The "telecommunications centers" use in the zoning code has historically covered this type of business in Madison but is outdated due to the evolving nature and range of data centers across the United States and Wisconsin. The moratorium allows City staff time to develop zoning and land use regulations for any potential future data centers.
Draft Zoning Regulation Framework Public Information Meeting
The City of Madison's Department of Planning and Community and Economic Development will hold a public information meeting on Tuesday, October 27, 2026, to update community members on a draft framework for proposed zoning regulations for data centers within city limits. The meeting will include a Q&A portion after the staff presentation.
The meeting will be held virtually on Zoom beginning at 5:30pm. Registration will be required to receive a link to the meeting.
The meeting will be recorded and added to this webpage so everyone in the community can access the information even if they are unable to attend the meeting.
Draft Zoning Regulation Framework
On September 29, 2026, City staff presented the recommendations for a potential framework to the Plan Commission.
These initial framework recommendations are based on months of research into the potential impacts of data centers, community concerns, and how other communities have regulated land use and zoning of data centers.
These are not finalized proposals and more work and opportunities for public input will be done in the coming weeks and months before anything is introduced to the Common Council and other City Boards, Commissions, and Committees for their consideration.
This included discussions on this draft regulation framework by the October 19, 2026, meeting of the Sustainable Madison Committee and the October 21, 2026, meeting of the Business and Economic Resources Committee. Like the Public Information Meeting, these were only informational presentations, and no policy decisions were made.
There will be multiple opportunities for public comment at Board, Commission, and Committee meetings in the coming months once an ordinance is formally drafted and introduced in the coming months. A schedule for those meetings will not be determined until the proposed ordinance is formally introduced.
How would this zoning and land use framework define a data center?
For the purposes of this regulation framework, staff is defining a data center as:
"A facility used for the storage, management, processing, and transmission of digital data, which houses computer or network equipment, systems, servers, appliances and other associated components related to digital data operations."
What is included in this proposed zoning and land use regulation framework?
At this time, staff recommends the following, with more detail about additional regulations provided lower on this page:
- Data centers larger than 100,000 square feet would not be allowed anywhere in the City of Madison.
- A data center would only be allowed to be in a single building, and only one data center building will be allowed on a property. Data center “campuses" (multiple smaller data centers on one lot) will not be allowed.
- Three data center types will be defined based on size, each with their own specific additional zoning requirements: those that are less than 10,000 square feet, those that are between 10,000 and 50,000 square feet, and those that are between 50,000 and 100,000 square feet. For additional context, a presentation during the June 29 Plan Commission meeting included examples of these sizes.
- A "data center map" will be added to the zoning code, creating a buffer between the industrial zones where a Large Data Center may be allowed and residential areas, areas planned for residential uses in the future, and parks and open space. The map depicts areas that are already zoned for industrial uses with a buffer further limiting the areas where a data center between 50,000 and 100,000 square feet would be allowed. This is not a map of where data centers have been proposed. As of now, this map has not been finalized and more work is being done by staff that may further change where facilities of that scale would be allowed.