A proposed 20-story data center tower in downtown Kansas City, Missouri, is putting forward an alternative to the sprawling suburban campus model that has dominated the industry. The project, designed by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill for developer Revitalization Unlimited, would stack computing, power, and cooling infrastructure on a parcel of roughly 0.23 acres. The plan remains subject to approval, with a related city development ordinance on hold until October 13.
The Case for Downtown
Steve Austin, founder and CEO of Revitalization Unlimited, argues that inference workloads, which answer user requests in near real time, benefit from being physically close to users and to carrier-rich connectivity. He points to nearby carrier infrastructure, planned diverse fiber entrances, and a carrier-neutral design as reasons customers might pay a premium for the location.
Industry analysts see the logic as workload-dependent. Luis Fernandes of IDC cited high-speed financial trading as a case where fractions of a second gained through physical proximity to exchange servers can matter commercially. Michael Martin of JLL said clients typically arrive with a business problem to solve rather than a preference for an urban address, and he sees opportunity in financial services, telecommunications, content delivery, and inference workloads at urban sites, while large AI training clusters still tend to favor locations with abundant land and power.
The Premium of Building Upward
Austin estimated total development costs at $183 million, or about $1,300 per square foot, which he acknowledged exceeds typical suburban per-square-foot costs. Of an estimated $167 million in hard construction costs, roughly $107 million would go toward mechanical, electrical, plumbing, and fire protection systems. The building would support 24 MW of IT load, but only two of its 20 floors would house computing equipment, with about 109,000 of its 141,000 gross square feet devoted to mechanical space.
Fernandes noted that most power and cooling equipment is designed for horizontal placement, meaning vertical builds face added challenges around weight distribution, freight elevator dimensions, crane access, and coordination with surrounding streets when equipment needs replacing.
Footprint and Operating Claims
Fernandes cautioned that a smaller land footprint does not necessarily mean a smaller overall environmental footprint, since no data currently supports that assumption. Austin said the project targets a power usage effectiveness of 1.25 and would rely on 30 MW of on-site Bloom fuel cells as its primary electricity source, with natural gas as an expected operating expense, meaning grid independence does not equate to zero environmental impact. Fernandes also questioned describing the cooling system as closed loop given its use of evaporative cooling, which consumes water.
Martin pointed to another path for urban capacity: converting existing buildings for smaller or edge workloads, which can reduce waste and speed up project timelines where a structure’s utility connections and infrastructure are suitable.