During the 1990s and early 2000s, a whole host of Kent’s seaside towns were living off past glories.

Let’s use Margate and Folkestone as key examples.

They had the architectural splendour which suggested the crowds once flocked, but much of it was in a steady decline. The rot had not only set in, but no-one had the nous – or, more importantly, money – to do anything about it.

They are unlike, for example, Whitstable, which had always been a pretty sleepy place before its food and drink-inspired transformation.

Anyone growing up during that time will remember people harking back to a long lost golden era of prosperity and popularity. They all wanted it back and seemed a little baffled as to why it had gone – as if Brighton had come along and stolen its success to take down to the South coast.

I must admit I rather liked both towns during their ‘unloved’ eras. A time before the Turner Contemporary, before Roger De Haan’s millions. They had a grit about them and a grubby inner beauty. But there was, undoubtedly, a sense that they were being passed by. Saying you lived in either in 1990 would be greeted by a sympathetic look rather than a flash of jealousy.

The Rotunda and Dreamland were attractions mirrored their host towns’ fortunes; in decline and a mere shadow of what they once were.

But then it started to change. The rollercoaster ride was about to continue.

Both harnessed the 21st century’s most unexpected catalyst for regeneration; art.

Yet many of those who complained of a loss of the ‘good old days’ were also quick to cock a snook at the arrival of galleries and public art installations. It was change, but not as they knew or liked.

They wanted a return to glory built on donkey rides, piers, lidos and candy floss. But those days – for these towns at least – have gone. It was a model which was a victim of our lifestyle and holiday destination demands; of increasing competition.

They moaned that there was all this investment being made but change was not instant. But streets never turn to gold overnight.

Art is a brave weapon to use in regeneration. It takes a good few years to bed in and is no guarantee of success.

It relies on working in down-at-heel towns where property and rents are cheap. It means folk from the Big Smoke can take a gamble – can open their art spaces, or their vegan cafes and have a fighting chance of survival.

In short, while you may not like Londoners trading in their one-bedroom flat in Clapham and finding it affords them a detached six-bedroom house on the coast and funds left over to open a business, it is precisely these people it aims to attract.

They, in turn, invest in the flagging local economy. They employ local people. And so the money-go-round begins. Success attracts more and more people wanting to get in on the ground floor. Gentrification – of parts of the towns at least – may be considered a small price to pay for the greater good.

The irony, of course, is that the doubters had forgotten that it is that most under-rated of industries, tourism, which elevated them to the heights in the first place.

All those grand buildings which line the seafronts were paid for by tourists – the bulk of them from London.

Folkestone today is a very different place to that I remember from my youth. But there’s a vitality to it now. It’s a destination again. Granted, the jury is probably still out on how the Rotunda site has been transformed into up-market housing, but there is no denying it is all part of the town turning a corner, around which is another ‘golden era’.

Margate managed to retain Dreamland and turn it into a venue which works perfectly for the modern age; a combination of rides and live music.

The healing impact of money is transforming its town centre. Yes, some bits are still a bit Sarf London, but there’s no harm in that. It certainly doesn’t want to suddenly be like Tunbridge Wells, after all.

Every generation fawns over the one it grew up in. Things were simpler, things were better, things were safer. They weren’t, of course.

Folkestone and Margate are deserving of their new found popularity. Those towns have worked hard to drag themselves up to compelling destinations once again. Those dissenting voices need to pipe down now and accept art is on the verge of creating two masterpieces of revival.