If you like watching stuff being torn down, and if you want to witness a pivotal event, get on out to Fort Worth Avenue in Oak Cliff at 9 a.m. Saturday and see the growling bulldozers work.

That's when demolition will begin on the time-worn Colorado Place Apartments, built in the 1940s.

Plans call for developing about 28 acres in the 2300 block of Fort Worth Avenue southwest of Colorado Boulevard.

Construction of 198 apartments for senior tenants, called the Fairways at La Reunion, is under way.

The next phases will be a mix of 220 apartments and about 24,000 square feet of retail on the south side of Fort Worth Avenue called The Orleans at La Reunion, and 95 apartments and about 4,000 square feet of shops on the north side called Courtyards at La Reunion, said David Krukiel, project manager. Construction should begin by next summer, he said.

For the present, you can watch the past give way to the future. The developer is providing free doughnuts, coffee and orange juice Saturday morning between the Minyard grocery store and Sonic Drive-In.

As a come-on from the Fort Worth Avenue Development Group puts it: "Bring your kids so they can witness a little bit of Oak Cliff history."

It should be a smashing time.