St. Thomas has put new data centres on hold. At its September 21st meeting, city council approved an interim control bylaw that stops anyone from using land in the city’s employment areas for a new data centre until September 21st, 2027. The city says the pause gives staff time to study what these buildings would mean for St. Thomas before a proposal lands on its desk.
A data centre is a building full of computer servers used to store, process and send out data from a distance. Interest in building them is growing across Ontario with the rise of cloud services and artificial intelligence. As LocVox reported last week, council asked staff for this bylaw on September 14th, after a report on the province’s draft Data Centre Playbook. At that point, the city said it had not accepted a complete data centre application.
What the pause covers
The bylaw applies to land the city’s Official Plan marks as Business Employment or Employment Lands, the areas set aside for industry and business. On that land, no one can use a lot or a building for a new data centre while the pause is on. A data centre that was already legally running when the bylaw passed may keep running, though the pause also covers additions and expansions. Every other use allowed on those lands carries on as normal. Facilities run by a public authority are left out.
Until now, the city’s zoning bylaw allowed a “computer, electronic or data processing centre” in its Business Employment zone. The pause takes that option away for now. In the Employment Lands zone, it was never allowed automatically, and the pause now blocks it there too. City staff say a data centre anywhere else in the city would need a change to the Official Plan, and likely would not be supported because it may not fit well with its neighbours.
What councillors asked
One councillor asked why the city needed the bylaw now, and why only for a year. The reply was that council has been asked a number of questions, and there is “a fair bit of unintentional misinformation out there” about data centres. Council wants staff to look at power use, water use, how much land one would take and how many workers it would need before anyone asks to build. The councillor said their own reading on the subject was “all over the map.”
A second councillor said the one-year pause lets the city “hold out for something a little bit better” on its industrial land, with more local, long-term jobs. That councillor asked the study to count day-to-day jobs, not just construction work, and to look at wastewater and at whether police and firefighters would need special equipment if there were a fire at a data centre.
A third councillor, one of council’s representatives at Entegrus, the utility that delivers electricity in St. Thomas, said the utility is also waiting for the province to fill in the details of its playbook. That councillor suggested St. Thomas ask the province whether it plans to finish the playbook, and compare notes with London and other municipalities that are likely working through the same questions.
What happens next
The study will look at noise, vibration, emissions, the demand on city infrastructure, including electricity and water, and how these buildings fit with the properties around them. It will help shape future rules in the city’s Official Plan and zoning bylaw.
The bylaw took effect the moment council passed it on September 21st, and it runs until 11:59 p.m. on September 21st, 2027. Ontario’s Planning Act lets council extend a pause like this, up to two years in total. Once it ends, the city cannot put another interim control bylaw on the same land for three years. That is why staff kept this one to the employment areas, leaving the city room to use the tool elsewhere later if it needs to.
Sources: St. Thomas council agenda, September 21, 2026 (Report PD-62-2026, Proposed Interim Control By-law), Keeping Track: City of St. Thomas Council Highlights, September 22, 2026, Issue 51
By Anthony Zruna · About the LocVox Newsroom
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