The concept is becoming reality, the plan to preserve and honor Huntsville’s former high school for black students emerging as a downtown park over the footprint of the school.

The first phase of the William Hooper Councill High School park, located on 2½ acres on St. Clair Avenue near the Huntsville-Madison County Public Library, is scheduled to be completed by May or June 2020 and the park should be completed altogether by November 2021.

"This is indeed a labor of love," said Brenda Chunn, president of the Councill Alumni Association which worked closely with the city of Huntsville to develop the park.

Click here to see a video flyover rendering of the park.

The park is aiming to honor those who attended Councill High School, including pavers in the park with the names of every student who ever went to the school. Though the school building no longer stands, the park's design seeks to preserve the school's footprint to give a sense of what the building was like.

There were also about 12,000 bricks recovered from the demolition of the school building that will be used in the park.

The Huntsville city council last week agreed to spend $1.4 million to build the park.

A rendering of the William Hooper Councill High School Park in downtown Huntsville honoring the city's former school for African Americans. The two white structures illustrate where tents could be set up for events at the park.

"This means a lot to our community," city council President Devyn Keith said. "There will be people from miles around who this means so much to."

It's a long-sought solution to how best remember Councill High School, which provided education for Huntsville's African American students from 1892-1966. Discussions focused on restoring the deteriorating building before cost concerns ultimately led to it being torn down.

Now the park's design will remember the school without the burden of restoration and preservation costs.

"When we came into office 11 years ago, we had a building falling down at that site," Huntsville Mayor Tommy Battle said. "It was almost a hazard. We couldn't come together with a good consensus on what to do. Mrs. Chunn and the alumni group came together and the help of (Keith) came up with a great idea on how to honor Councill High School and everyone who went there. I think we've come up with a plan that is very good."

The park will include several sculptures, including one of Councill – who was the founder and first president of what became Alabama A&M University in 1875. Councill was a former slave who became a lawyer, newspaper editor, legislator and Alabama Supreme Court justice.

An archway that serves as an entrance to the park will be at the same spot as the main entrance to the high school. The sidewalk leading up to that entrance will have sculptures of boys and girls as if they were going to school.

When park visitors visit the school, they are actually going to be walking the hallways of Councill High School, entering the gym spaces, the cafeteria spaces, the theater spaces, the courtyard," said Chad Bostick of Bostick Landscape Architects, which designed the park.

"It's the culmination of a lot of design meetings and thought," Bostick said. "What we wanted to do here in the design was honor the school itself and the students that went there and all their experiences and opportunities."

There will also be electricity and water infrastructure to support events at the park.

Another unique aspect to the park will be four vertical columns that will tell the story and history of Councill High School.

"This is Huntsville history," Chunn said, "some of us more so than others but it is Huntsville history and we are so pleased to have a place where all of our students, all of our learners, all of our families can come and reflect upon what goes back to the 1800s when William Hooper Councill High School opened.

“We have waited a long time for this project to take wings, to bear fruit, to come to fruition and here it is. We hope we will be there when it opens. To see what we have right now, it raises us to higher heights and lifts us to places you cannot imagine.”