When the Superconducting Super Collider was built, was the future of the site planned for?

Question

The Superconducting Super Collider was the greatest experiment that was never built. It was cancelled in 1993 after years of planning and effort, during which there was some construction of facilities. The site may be used in the future, but I haven't been able to find much information on plans for it. When the project was cancelled, were any plans made for the future of the site?

Answer 1

Not. At. All.

The plans for the future of the site of the SSC resembled the collider itself in that they were nonexistent. When Congress refused the extend the budget for the project, no alternative ideas for the site went anywhere.

From the Sun-Journal:

In Ellis County, Texas, where the collider was being built, owners of condemned houses and others who have invested in businesses and land were wondering what would fill the vacuum left by tunneling the atom smasher. "Right now, it's a billion-dollar hole in the ground. And they're arguing about whether to fill it back up," said Allan Oakley, a Waxahachie police officer and co-owner of the Kountry Café in nearby Maypearl.

From an article here from 2006:

GVA Cawley has been tapped to market the former Superconducting Super Collider property in Waxahachie. The 134-acre site, which includes 200,000 square feet of space, has been vacant since the super collider project was canceled in 1993.

It recently was acquired by Collider Data Center L.L.C., a Dallas-based investment group led by J.B. Hunt.

So evidently no plans were made for about 13 years.

This suggests that no plans really got anywhere, until a chemical company bought up the site:

Plans for the derelict site have included everything from mushroom farms to data storage in the years since its colossal failure, but despite local protests, the land was purchased by a chemical company who will hopefully find a good use for one of America’s most ambitious scientific missteps.

This article names that company as Magnablend.

Finally, this indicates that the property was given to the county to do what they wished with it:

After project cancellation, the site was given to Ellis County Texas. Numerous attempts to sell the property failed until 2006, when a private investment group finally purchased the property. It was rumored there were plans to use the SSC as a tier III or IV data center, but in 2011 the property still sat derelict and abandoned.

So the answer appears to be that no plans were made. This report, though, is illuminating. And a little bit hopeful.