Digital Realty data centers: 103 sites mapped

Digital Realty rents data center space to other companies and has been in the business long enough that many of its fights are in cities rather than farmland. Its best known Chicago building, at 350 East Cermak Road, was a printing plant built around 1912 that now covers 1.1 million square feet with 109 megawatts of capacity, used by hundreds of companies including Zoom. On the vacant lot next door, at 21st Street and Calumet Avenue in the South Loop, Digital Realty has proposed a $500 million, 13-story, 565,069 square foot data center joined to Cermak by a bridge.

Residents who already live with noise and soot from the Cermak building oppose the new one. "We have many examples of years of bad acting from Digital Realty, and they don't deserve the opportunity to put up another data center," said Tina Feldstein of the Prairie District Neighborhood Alliance. Neighbors had collected about 680 signatures against the plan by September 2023. At the company's older building at 600 South Federal Street, the city's health department found rooftop generators exceeded the noise ordinance in 2021 and fined Digital Realty $300; the company later built a 15-foot sound wall.

In Atlanta, Digital Realty wants to build a $500 million data center at 713 Ralph David Abernathy Boulevard, where the West End, Adair Park and Mechanicsville neighborhoods meet, within a five-minute walk of a MARTA station. Atlanta has banned data centers within half a mile of MARTA stations since 2024; a council member has proposed an amendment allowing them under conditions. In April a neighborhood planning unit voted 105 to 87 against the change, and in July the Zoning Review Board upheld the ban. The City Council is holding the amendment with no date set.

At an August 3 council meeting, resident Norma Harris said, "Once we have it in a neighborhood, any neighborhood, you can't take it away." Community advocate Tyrone Clemons called it "redlining 2.0," saying large developments by private interests keep landing in predominantly Black areas. Digital Realty has offered $10 million in community investment.

Every project above is drawn from public records, filings and local reporting. Each row links to what it is based on. Statuses change, so check the source date before you rely on one. Found something wrong? Write to [email protected] and it gets fixed.