After contentious Amazon datacenter fight, US county says it has learned a lesson
'We love our farms' says Culpeper, but we also like internet mega-souk and others setting up servers
Interview When we last checked in on Culpeper County, Virginia, folks there were contesting the construction of an Amazon datacenter while officials sought to attract more server-hosting estates to the area.
Fast forward a couple of years, and while that proposed Amazon build went ahead in the end, the county's strategy has changed. Rather than foster five development zones packed with cloud computing centers, it opted instead for a more modest Culpeper Technology Zone, or CTZ.
"We learned a lot through [the Amazon] process," Culpeper Economic Development Director Bryan Rothamel told The Register in an interview you can watch below.
"Power is not unlimited everywhere. We are taking a much smaller approach. We still want Culpeper to be Culpeper. We love our greenery, we love our farms."
The CTZ is a 690-acre plot that has two datacenter facilities on it already and may expand to six. The county wants to avoid over-saturating itself with these kinds of installations, as other parts of the US East Coast are experiencing. Datacenter builders love putting down buildings in this region of America, there is huge demand to develop land for that industry, and the CTZ is simply "the best we could do to prepare for it," Rothamel said. ®
Biting the hand that feeds IT
