Folkestone Warren: the railway’s lost property

Abstract

The white chalk cliffs of the south coast of England are often seen as imposing and impregnable barriers that help the Channel to keep our shores free from foreign invasion. However, in some places the chalk cliffs seem far from stable, and prone to rapid and calamitous collapse into the sea. One such locality is an area of land lying just to the east of Folkestone: Folkestone Warren (TR 250380). Here we see not a simple bold cliff facing out across the Channel but a much more jumbled up piece of scenery on whose seaward edge man has plainly been forced to build extensive and ugly sea walls and other defences against the waves.