The size of an average American football field is 1.32 acres. Deep inside a small Texas town, a tech company has acquired enough space to fit more than 150 of them, but the development is drawing backlash from residents in Medina County.
Tract, a Colorado-headquartered data center land acquisition and development company, is developing on a massive piece of land in Medina County. It’s far from being the first futuristic assignment in the area near Castroville, but it’s one of the largest to date.
With the capability to produce or consume 500 million watts of electrical power, it’s being designed to support the data center market in San Antonio, roughly 29 miles east, according to the plan description. DataCenterMap.com notes the Alamo City is home to at least 80 providers.
Both the Medina Electric Cooperative (MEC) and East Medina County Special Utility District (SUD) will service the site. Tract describes it as being “well positioned to support significant capacity growth and accelerated delivery proximate to existing data center development.”
The tech park will be adjacent to Microsoft’s campus, SAT 89, which already occupies 489,400 square feet, according to state filings.
Site energization, when a property is approved to begin using power, is slated for mid-2028, according to Tract. The company owns two other zones of land in Texas and has a presence in seven states.
User Lilly Jo wrote, “I never would have bought in Castroville had I known that the plans for Castroville were to destroy it and turn it into an industrial park.”
Residents have expressed a range of concerns. These include water usage levels similar to other sites, potential emissions and possible effects on property values. Washington’s Environmental and Energy Study Institute notes that large centers “can consume up to 5 million gallons per day, equivalent to the water use of a town populated by 10,000 to 50,000 people.”
“East Medina Water can’t keep up with what they have now,” another user, Ann Marie Burts, commented. “Our water pressure is terrible.”
MySA reached out to Tract to ask how it plans to address concerns such as these, but it did not hear back in time for publication. On its website, it described itself as “the catalyst for sustainable land use intentionally focused on data center planning and integration into local communities.”
Castroville Mayor Bruce Alexander deferred to Medina County officials, stating that the development is outside city limits. MySA is awaiting further comment from the county judge’s office.