HUNTSVILLE, Alabama - Anti-abortion activists working to shut down North Alabama's lone abortion clinic will get their day in court Thursday.

Madison County Circuit Judge Alan Mann has scheduled a 9 a.m. hearing on a civil lawsuit filed in early September against the Huntsville Board of Zoning Adjustment.

James Henderson, executive director of the Christian Coalition of Alabama. speaks during a July 2014 "memorial service" to mark the closing of Alabama Women's Center for Reproductive Alternatives on Madison Street. (Bob Gathany | bgathany@al.com)

The suit, brought by Christian Coalition of Alabama Executive Director James Henderson and 18 other plaintiffs, contends the zoning board "erroneously determined" that Alabama Women's Center for Reproductive Alternatives could operate within a residential district.

In 1998, the zoning board granted Huntsville Hospital a use variance to open an outpatient medical facility at 4831 Sparkman Drive.

Huntsville Manager of Planning Services Jim McGuffey ruled in May - and a majority of zoning board members later agreed - that the variance should carry over to Alabama Women's Center, which now owns the building.

The lawsuit argues the variance was exclusively for the Huntsville Hospital-managed outpatient facility, which closed in 2013. Henderson and the other plaintiffs also contend the abortion clinic is a distraction for students going to school nearby.

The clinic is almost directly across Sparkman Drive from the former Ed White Middle School, which is being remodeled to house the Academy for Academics & Arts magnet school.

The Napa, Calif.-based Life Legal Defense Foundation is representing Alabama anti-abortion activists in the lawsuit.

Alabama Women's Center surrendered its state abortion provider license in late June because its cramped Madison Street location could not be retrofitted to comply with the Alabama Women's Health and Safety Act of 2013. The act placed tougher building standards on abortion clinics, including overhead sprinkler systems and doors and hallways wide enough to accommodate ambulance gurneys.

Clinic owner Dalton Johnson bought the former Huntsville Hospital space at 4831 Sparkman Drive; inspectors from the Alabama Department of Public Health recently certified that the building complies with state law.

The clinic re-opened Oct. 13.