I have very fond childhood memories of Folkestone.

Back in the early 1980s, I can remember sitting up on the cliff top on Wear Bay Road (close to the Warren), eating fish and chips and looking down at the ferries coming and going from the port; the passenger vessels coming alongside what is now the reimagined Harbour Arm.

It was a regular day out from our home in west Kent – a chance to take in the sea air and walk in the footsteps of family members who had enjoyed its sights and sounds in the past.

When we moved to the east of the county the visits only increased.

I enjoyed strolling along the harbour – stopping to try what seemed like a vast number of seafood stalls selling the latest catch. Chummys was there then…but with just a modest stall…last time I visited it had morphed into something rather bigger and more sophisticated. More seafood cafe than shellfish stall.

Then we’d try out the whelks or cockles while looking over its harbour – chucking the occasional scrap to the seagulls which circled around us.

But no day trip there was quite complete without a trip to the Rotunda.

Sprawling along the seafront, it was like a more streamlined, less hemmed-in, Dreamland.

There was the boating pond, where you could take a pedalo out, crazy golf and a host of rides – some of which rivalled that found in the Margate pleasure palace.

Dodgems, a helter-skelter and a log flume – and all pretty much sited on the very edge of the shingle.

On Sundays there would be a big open-air market, ‘bring big bags and little money’ was the slogan it used to have on the TVS adverts plugging it.

But at its heart were its two landmark domes. Inside each were the enticing flashing lights and sounds of arcade and fruit machines. Keen to consume any spare pocket money for a moment’s experience.

Coin pushers, Space Invaders, Asteroids, Pacman...they were all there.

This, of course, was in an era before consoles nestled below the TV sets of the masses. If you wanted to play these exciting new games – well you had to pump them full of 10 pence pieces.

Back then the closest you got to a first-person shooter was a shooting gallery based on a classic ‘hillbilly’ scene where beams of light, well-aimed, would set off basic little mechanisms like a barrel popping open. Simple pleasures...but great fun.

Over the years I kept returning as I got older and felt that pang of regret as I witnessed its gradual decline.

By the time I was able to take my own children there by the late 1990s, it was a pale shadow of its former self. The domes still stood...but little else did. My memories of sun-soaked days replaced by the harsh reality of our changing habits.

Today, of course, it is all gone.

I totally understand Folkestone’s pursuit of a different future, though. Its transformation of its seafront, or its harbour arm, are necessary steps to give it future prosperity. Much better that than let it become a relic of a bygone era.

One of these days I’ll head back down there to see all the transformations and no doubt enjoy myself intensely.

Right now, though, in my mind’s eye, I still have sight of those domes, the rides and all the fun and laughs that site once generated.