DENVER (CBS4) – A community is coming together to restore a piece of Denver’s history. It’s a green structure on the corner of Downing and Marion Parkway in Denver’s Washington Park neighborhood.

At most, maybe you thought it was a fancy bus stop, but it’s actually a trolley stop from the turn of the last century.

Now, students from the Community College of Denver are working with Denver Parks and Recreation and Historicorp to restore the structure. These students aren’t used to getting their hands dirty.

“Most of these students have never lifted a hammer or tools,” said Lecturer Mark Bell. “These are architecture students.”

Bell helped organize the project for his students because being outdoors deconstructing this building is a great learning opportunity for them.

“We want to get students out and have them do some work on an actual site. This is the type of collaboration and teamwork that they will be expected to perform as they become architects.”

Luckily it’s still in pretty good condition, but it is a historic site which means they have to be extra careful restoring it, and also have to find replacement pieces that are one of a kind.

“Some of the trim around this roof, it’s a crown mold-style trim. Unfortunately, this profile… this particular style doesn’t exist. It was probably hand cut by someone, so they’ve had to contract with a local shop to create a cutter that can re-cut that trim.”

While a lot of these students would probably rather be sketching this trolley stop rather than restoring it, the lessons they learn here in the field will help them become better architects in the future.

“We spent a couple hours putting up scaffolds. Probably that wouldn’t have been a thought to them if they were running work that that’s one of those pieces that has to be done before we can start,” said Bell. “It’s not just an architect sitting in an office. They’re part of a bigger team.”

According to C.C.D.’s research, this is the only surviving trolley stop in the Mile High City.