Commissioners Discuss Proposed Greenlin Park Data Center

By Grace Bennett

With the anticipation of completing the full build-out by 2030, JK Land Holdings II LLC has submitted an application for the development of a new data center within Greenlin Park. The subject area would include 81.17 acres of forest and former farmland on a 467-acre parcel. The application is still pending due to outstanding issues that require resolution before the project is undertaken.

The property would first need to be rezoned from the Transitional Residential (TR-10) and the Joint Land Management Area (JLMA-20) to the Industrial Park (IP) Zoning District.

Approximately two million square feet would be granted to data center and utility substation usage, which exceeds the 1.75 million square feet referenced in the most recent Traffic Impact Study.

The area under consideration within Greenlin Park is to the west of Sycolin Road and north of the Dulles Greenway, and is currently non-residential and occupied by vegetation, steep slopes, and major floodplains.

The subject area’s location relative to Sycolin Road raises concerns regarding the impact on traffic. “[The road is] getting busier, and busier, and busier,” said Sterling Planning Commissioner Clifford Keirce.

“It’s got the school on it—which a couple times a day leads to a mess because the turn lane is not long enough and blocks the through lanes because everyone is waiting for people to turn. We are getting more industrial uses. You have a FedEx—I get the feeling that is going to be very busy with lots of vehicles coming and going,” said Keirce.

The application for the project provides an approximation of added vehicular traffic during the building process. During peak hours, the interim phase predicts 373 morning trips, 358 evening trips, and 3,384 typical weekday trips.

The applicant, as a result, has agreed to provide monetary support and/or general improvements to Sycolin Road, and while clarification is still requested, the applicant has agreed to support the addition of a signal light and/or an intersection if deemed necessary by a traffic study. New turn lanes and a re-striping of the road will also be considered at no public cost.

Another outstanding issue with the construction of the data center on the property addresses the environment—due to the steep slopes and the major floodplain that would be occupied by the new building, storm runoff might be negatively impacted.

The applicant has promised to mitigate impacts via replanting trees and establishing stormwater facilities. In response to questions raised about potential harm to the endangered wood turtle native to the area, the applicant has also agreed to conduct a habitat study and is expected to take recommended action in preserving the species.

However, the location for the data center could not be easily altered. “…With every application submission,” said Walsh Colucci consulting representative Sasha Brower, “we’ve further reduced our impact to the steep area there—and this is permitted encroachment per the zoning ordinance—so we’ve dramatically reduced our encroachment with each submission, but we are constrained by where the site location has to be.”

Further concerns over the preservation of archaeological sites have been in major part resolved by the conducting of surveys and the recovery of historically significant remains.

Several strategies will also be employed to optimize the data center’s performance and minimize waste to water and electricity as well as monitoring air quality and phosphorus reduction. Regardless, the energy pulled by the data center would create the need for new transmission lines in the area, which could be a point of contention when combined with another outstanding issue of the project—building height and space occupation.

The applicant has proposed a 60-foot height for the data center (approximately five stories), which violates the Transition Light Industrial (TLI) place type limit of 36 feet for the project (approximately three stories).

While other data centers have been approved for a 60-foot height, none have been so close to the road, and even with the promise of planting trees on the border of the road facing the building, this point continues to be debated by the Planning Commission. Staff has also requested clarification on the architectural renderings for the data center to ensure compliance with the Concept Development Plan’s policy on open space.

With the ongoing debate and the application submitted for Greenlin Park’s potential new data center and transmission lines, the project has not yet been approved—the applicant will return for further discussion in July.