Styles and grades
Aluminum fences are sold as panels between posts, almost always powder-coated black, with bronze, white and green as options. The top is flat, pressed-point (spear) or a puppy-picket design with tighter spacing at the bottom for small pets.
- Residential grade: lighter pickets and rails, fine for yards and most pools.
- Commercial grade: heavier pickets and rails, for apartment complexes, HOA amenity areas and anywhere people lean on it.
- Industrial grade: heaviest, for security perimeters.
Front yards and corner lots
Front-yard fences are held lower than back-yard fences across the area. Decatur's ordinance allows 4 feet in a residential front yard. In Madison, city staff reports describe higher limits for front fences that are mostly open, which is exactly what an aluminum picket fence is. On corner lots, keep anything near the intersection out of the sight-line triangle; Decatur's ordinance bars fences from visibility triangles, and other cities have similar rules.
Pool enclosures
Aluminum is the most common pool barrier because the picket spacing and height can meet pool rules out of the box. The CPSC guidelines most local codes follow call for a barrier at least 48 inches high, openings that will not pass a 4-inch sphere, and gates that open outward, away from the pool, and close and latch on their own. Unincorporated Madison County requires a 48-inch pool barrier under the pool code it adopted. See pool fences.
Hills and slopes
Huntsville sits between Monte Sano, Green Mountain and the other ridges of the Cumberland Plateau's edge, and plenty of yards are not flat. Many aluminum panels can be racked, meaning the rails tilt to follow the slope while the pickets stay vertical. Steeper grades need stepped panels or custom ones. Ask the contractor how much rack the panel line allows.
Aluminum fence cost
National guides put aluminum at about $25–$75 per linear foot installed, with commercial grade, taller panels and decorative tops at the high end. Gates add materially, especially self-closing pool gates and double drive gates. No Huntsville-specific pricing is published that we could verify.
Compared with wrought iron, which runs about $50–$85 per foot nationally, aluminum gives a similar look for less, with no rust to manage.
Main guide: fence companies in Huntsville, AL.