ELMORE, Ala. — Off Highway 143 in rural Elmore County, the Alabama Department of Corrections is building a small town.

On 300 acres behind a tall chain-link fence, some of the more than four dozen, two-story buildings that will make up the 4,000-bed, $1.08 billion prison are starting to take shape. A one million-gallon water tank is up near what will be the main entrance.

Water and sewer lines have been buried; hundreds of miles of electrical conduit are being run to housing units where 256 men will live in two-person cells. Eventually, the electrical lines will power in each unit a central monitoring station where officers will have direct lines of sight down four corridors on inmates. There will be video cameras and electronically locking cell doors that officials promise will make this site much safer and more manageable than the state’s existing major prisons.