Rural Sanders Lane neighbors mull selling to data centers

Data center fever might be spreading to Sanders Lane, a north-south route just north of Pageland Lane  where officials are already considering land-use and zoning changes to create a new data corridor in rural, northwest Prince William County.

On Sunday, April 3, more than 100 residents along Sanders Lane gathered at the home of Josiah Hunter, who lives on Boxwood Farms Drive. Hunter said it was just a neighborhood meeting for the purpose of getting good information to curious residents who wanted to learn more about data center activity on Pageland Lane. 

Sanders Lane is a 4-mile, two-lane stretch that runs between Sudley and Braddock roads. Its southern end kisses the northern end of Pageland Lane, where antagonism runs high between the opponents and proponents of the proposed data center corridor. Like Pageland, Sanders is paralleled by Dominion Energy’s high-power transmission lines, which could power data buildings.

The bucolic road hosts a smattering of signs protesting the proposed digital development to the south. 

Hunter said the group did not discuss doing business with data center operators, nor organizing to oppose them. He also said he did not know how many of the attendees might be interested in doing a data center deal.

“I think there’s a number in the neighborhood who are interested and a number who are not,” he said. 

He said that he, personally, is opposed to the so-called “PW Digital Gateway” under consideration to the south.  But he said it would be unfair for county officials to change the land-use designation along Pageland Lane to allow for data centers and not do the same for Sanders Lane, which would leave him and his neighbors “stuck next to” a data center corridor.

One of the speakers at Sunday night was Supervisor Pete Candland, R-Gainesville, who lives on Livia Drive off Pageland Lane and who – he says, reluctantly – signed on with an assemblage of landowners to sell their property to a data center builder if all terms are met.

Candland spoke for 30 minutes, Hunter said. He explained what comprehensive plan amendments are, how they relate to rezonings and why data centers are attractive as sources of tax revenue. 

Candland also told the crowd that the Bi-County Parkway is dead, Hunter said. Others told what they knew of data center offers and contracts that had been signed by landowners along Pageland Lane. 

The meeting was partly instigated by Dori Burner, one of the organizers of an assemblage on Pageland Lane, who had previously appeared at a Sanders Lane home to talk to residents. According to a letter that served as an invitation to the meeting, Burner had met with some homeowners on Sanders Lane and told them that she and a partner had lined up data center land buyers if residents wanted to sell. The letter suggested sales of $1 million an acre were possible.

But Burner was not invited to Sunday’s meeting because she was not a neighborhood resident and has an interest in data center development, Hunter said. 

Reach Peter Cary at news@fauquier.com