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"telecommunications centers" use in the zoning code has historically covered this type of business in Madison but is outdated due to the evolving nature and range of data centers across the United States and Wisconsin.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 held 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 included a Q&A portion after the staff presentation. More details on that draft regulation framework are listed below.
The recording of the meeting is available on this page for those who were unable to attend, and a copy of the presentation slides is also available for reference.
Those who were unable to attend the meeting can still submit questions and feedback by sending an email to pccomments@cityofmadison.com.
Draft Zoning Regulation Framework
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 at 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 additional opportunities for public comment at Board, Commission, and Committee meetings in the coming months once an ordinance is formally drafted and introduced. A schedule for those meetings will not be finalized 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. This is not a server room."
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) would 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.
- Adding a "data center map" to the zoning code that creates a buffer between the industrial zones where a data center of 50,000 to 100,000 square feet 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.