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An old red barn on the west side of Interstate 5 in Wilsonville has stood for more than 100 years while the community around it has evolved from a sleepy, rural area into a commercial and industrial hub.

Now the dilapidated structure with a moss-covered roof is about to be knocked down to make room for 112 apartments for senior citizens.

Developers at Holland Partners Group don’t plan to build their complex, called Active Adults at the Grove, on the site of the barn. They are knocking down the barn so they have greater traffic access to the construction site and a place to pile building materials.

The barn, most recently part of a farm owned by Roger Ash and his family, is not a big loss to Wilsonville, said Blaise Edmonds, the city’s manager of current planning. However, he said, townsfolk have a certain sentimental attachment to it.

“It’s important to people in Wilsonville in terms of it being an old structure, and it certainly is something of an I-5 landmark, but it’s not on the list of historic structures in Clackamas County or on the National Register of Historic Places,” Edmonds said.

The project went through development review and received approval for its site design in late May, but developers have a hurdle to clear before they can take down the barn and start construction. Wilsonville City Council on July 15 will review the latest proposal because developers want to tack on 66 additional units.

A zone change approved by city officials last year limits the number of units on the site. Edmonds doesn’t anticipate much resistance for developers.

“If they are successful at the city council, there’s a 30-day time period until the ordinance takes effect,” he said. “After that, they can probably start moving dirt.”

Josh McDonald, a spokesman for Holland Partners Group, would not talk about the development. He said only that the company was putting together a press packet that would be available within the next couple of weeks.

Active Adults at the Grove is expected to cover 3.41 acres of a larger 60-acre development Holland Partners Group executives have already started on both the east and west sides of the interstate. McDonald said last year that the entire project would cost approximately $44 million. The rest of the development includes market-rate single-family housing and apartment units.

Edmonds said the senior complex would be a four-story building with three elevators. It would not provide assisted living, he said, but would be restricted to people age 55 and older. It would occupy the former site of the Thunderbird Mobile Club.