The city council is are developing designs for improvements along the Roseburn to South Gyle route known as Quiet Route 9, which extends west to east between South Gyle and Roseburn Park.
The first phase focuses on sites in the Balgreen area, and we would like to get people’s views to help us shape the final designs.
The work will help to make the streets safer and easier to use for anyone walking, wheeling and cycling.
You can comment and share your views before 27 March at:
THURSDAY 22 FEBRUARY from 2 – 4pm
at WEST PILTON NEIGHBOURHOOD CENTRE
Join us for a Cyber Safety Information Session!
Where: West Pilton Neighbourhood Centre (19 West Pilton Grove, Edinburgh EH4 4BY)
When: Thursday, 22 February, 2pm – 4pm
Free event! Sign up in advance to secure your place at https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/…/make-it-happen-cyber…
Learn how to stay safe online, protect your personal information, and recognise risks of fraud, scams, and identity theft at this free information session!
Presented by North Edinburgh Arts’ Make it Happen project in partnership with People Know How.
For more information or questions, please email Asia at asia@northedinburgharts.co.uk.
Proudly supported by the Scottish Ecosystem Fund 2023-24.
Just a reminder that we are now looking for donations for our Big Swap event at St Martin’s Community Resource Centre, Edinburgh, which will take place on Saturday 2nd March.
Big Swap is a big FREE giveaway of all preloved items including clothes, shoes, household items, books, toys etc.
At the moment, at Granton Parish Church, Edinburgh we are accepting the following donations until Thursday 29/02:
– good condition household items,
-men and teenager clothes and shoes.
All donated items must be CLEAN and in GOOD, WORKING CONDITION.
Any questions-email: anna@grantongoesgreener.org.uk
Road policing officers are appealing for information after a pedestrian was struck by a bus in Edinburgh. The incident happened on Oxgangs Road North, near the junction with Oxgangs Avenue, around 8.50pm last night. (Friday 16 February).
The 74-year-old male pedestrian was taken to the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh for treatment to serious injuries.
No one on the bus was injured.
The road was closed until around 3.25am this morning (Saturday, 17 February) to allow for an investigation at the scene.
Sergeant Grant Hastie, of the Road Policing Unit in Edinburgh, said: “Our enquiries are ongoing and I would urge anyone who may have information to get in touch.
“We would be keen to speak to anyone who was on the bus who hasn’t yet spoken to an officer, or anyone who may have dashcam footage from the area around the time of the collision.
“Anyone who can help is asked to call 101, quoting reference 3657 of 16 February.”
INFORMATION SESSIONS TOMORROW AND MONDAY
We’re putting the finishing touches to our brand new Stockbridge shop, which will now open on Wednesday 21st February instead of Saturday 17th!
We can’t wait to welcome everyone along to Stockbridge’s newest addition at 10-12 Hamilton Place at 10am!
Do Ho Suh: Tracing Time
National Galleries Scotland: Modern One
17 February – 1 September 2024
Admission Free
Do Ho Suh | Tracing Time | National Galleries of Scotland
Immerse yourself in the imagination of one of the world’s leading contemporary artists. This weekend, Do Ho Suh (born 1962, Seoul), brings his first Scottish exhibition to National Galleries Scotland: Modern One.
Don’t miss this unique opportunity to marvel at Do Ho Suh’s larger-than-life thread drawings, take in his never-before-seen sketchbooks and wander through the artist’s iconic architectural hubs, experiencing Suh’s colourful, interconnected, life-size ‘homes’.
Opening today. Do Ho Suh: Tracing Time is free to visit, taking over the entire ground floor of Modern One in Edinburgh until 1 September 2024.
This major solo exhibition by the South Korean-born, London-based artist will be the largest European exhibition to date of his work on paper, with artworks spanning 25 years of Suh’s career. With over 100 works on display, many never seen before, the artist poses questions such as ‘Where and when does home exist?’ and ‘What defines our sense of place?’.
Do Ho Suh: Tracing Time explores the important role that drawing and paper play in Suh’s work, focusing on his collaborative methods, experimental techniques, and ingenious use of materials. The exhibition will travel forwards and backwards in time, organised according to the artist’s transformative approaches to drawing as a toolkit with endless possibilities.
Visitors will discover Suh’s compelling and technically innovative thread drawings, where multicoloured threads are embedded in handmade paper to create sewn images of some of the artist’s most iconic motifs. Thread takes on a new form as a mode of drawing, mirroring the use of fabric in the artist’s sculptures.
The thread drawings are created at STPI – Creative Workshop & Gallery, Singapore, where Suh has been working collaboratively with the Creative Workshop team for over a decade; experimenting together to produce his works on paper. Works on display from this series include the dazzling Staircase/s (2019); a seemingly impossible vertical stack of colour, winding and repeating the communal staircase from Suh’s New York apartment building, the embroidery process creating a cloud of loose threads in its wake.
These monumental thread drawings will be exhibited alongside animations, architectural rubbings, paper sculptures, printmaking and watercolours, including works such as A Perfect Home (1999); a simple, even childlike, drawing of a tiny home and garden, perched in an impossible location.
This watercolour was the starting point for the artist’s longest running research project, The Bridge Project, which explores the idea of his ‘perfect’ home. The project considers what form this home might take and questions whether such a thing exists. For Suh, it’s located in the centre of a bridge that connects Seoul, New York and London, the three cities he has called home. The Bridge Project demonstrates that a sketch has the power to develop into something far greater.
A selection of the artist’s sketchbooks will also be shown publicly for the first time, giving visitors an insight into the personal, unconstrained spaces in which Suh explores his past, present and future.
Using both practical problem solving and imaginative sketching, drawing helps Suh to imagine new relationships between architecture and the body, and new ways of challenging and re-defining shared public spaces.
The exhibition includes an immersive installation of Suh’s famed ‘hubs’; life-size sculptures that recreate in colourful fabric transitional spaces – thresholds, corridors and doorways – inspired by sites meaningful to the artist. Visitors to the exhibition can enter and move through these installations, giving a real-scale sense of the places which hold significance to the artist.
The translucency of the fabric which forms these hubs expands on the idea of memory being personal and subjective. It also highlights the rigidity of Western architecture in comparison to traditional Korean buildings. Suh’s fabric architecture can be packed down and transported; a means of carrying home with you.
Paper is also treated as sculptural material. Tracing Time includes a series of Suh’s ‘rubbings’; works made using a physically challenging process of coating the entire interiors of rooms in paper, which is then carefully rubbed in pencil and chalk to create an impression of the original spaces.
Suh’s engaging and imaginative artworks collectively ask questions about home and identity, inviting visitors to consider their own answer. Individual experiences of what home is on a personal level can create a fundamental part of who we are, often influenced by day-to-day life and deepest memories. Drawing is Suh’s way of navigating the world, capturing overlooked details, and making sense of how we relate to one another.
Tracing Time gathers many threads of the artist’s work and its celebration of human collaboration and creative networks.
Do Ho Suh said: “I am thrilled to be presenting my first exhibition in Scotland at the National Galleries.
“Paper has been a foundational element of my practice for as long as I’ve been working. It’s more than a medium for me and I’ve sometimes felt that in the West, paper’s strength – literally and symbolically – is underestimated.
“For me, it has sculptural, architectural and bodily qualities. It works in part because of its mercurial capacities – the ways in which it can absorb, and integrate with, other materials, rather than merely providing a surface for them to sit on.
“It’s exciting to have this element of my practice engaged with so sensitively and I cannot wait to share this body of work at Modern One.”
Anne Lyden, Director-General at the National Galleries of Scotland said: “The National Galleries of Scotland are delighted to welcome the wonderfully imaginative and thought-provoking artwork of Do Ho Suh to Modern One; a monumental first not only for the galleries but for Scotland.
“Do Ho Suh: Tracing Time challenges our perception of the art of drawing, showing the endless possibilities that can stem from putting our ideas, thoughts and dreams onto a blank page.
“Tracing Time also provides a space to reflect and consider the topic of ‘home’; the interconnecting thread which collectively binds us to the places, and people, that impact us the most.
“We hope our visitors will join us in witnessing this awe-inspiring experience at Modern One and take some time to marvel in the ingenious, creative flair of one of the most remarkable artists working today.”
Do Ho Suh: Tracing Time opens at National Galleries Scotland: Modern One today = on Saturday 17 February 2024.
Steps to address depopulation and help future-proof communities
A wide-ranging plan to strengthen communities facing population decline, including funding for local-led research, initiatives, and community support has been published.
Projections show that Scotland’s population is set to fall from 2033, with fourteen local authority areas projected to experience population decline over the next decade. The Addressing Depopulation Action Plan will set out the Scottish Government’s strategy to support people to live, work and raise families in the places affected – many of which are rural and island areas.
A £180,000 Addressing Depopulation Fund will initially help three acutely affected local authorities trial ways of retaining and attracting people to their communities. The projects to receive funds will be announced later this year.
Part-funding has been provided this financial year by the Scottish Government for Community Settlement Officers in Argyll & Bute, Highland and Comhairle nan Eilean Siar, enabling them to continue supporting people living in or moving to those areas. Part-funding for these roles has also been put forward for the next financial year, as well as support for a Community Settlement Officer to be established in Inverclyde.
Dumfries and Galloway Council will receive £30,000 to research the causes of local population decline, to inform the development of future policy interventions.
Launching the plan at the Nevis Centre in Fort William, Migration Minister Emma Roddick said: “The factors that lead to depopulation are complex and interdependent, and every place is affected differently.
“This plan cuts right across government – in policy areas including housing, healthcare, transport and education – to help deliver solutions that address the needs of individual areas.
“Local leaders, councils and organisations are the people who know their communities best – that’s why this plan commits to channelling community expertise and backing a range of local-led initiatives. This will not only benefit the places leading these projects, but could also generate learnings that can be applied elsewhere.
“Bringing together new actions with a programme of ongoing government work, these steps will underpin our work to ensure every place in Scotland is equipped with the population it needs to thrive into the future.”
15,000 Start Up Loans worth over £100 million have now been issued to young business founders aged 18-24 since 2012.
The Start Up Loan Scheme is government backed finance delivered through British Business Bank, which has delivered over £1 billion in loans to SMEs across the country since the scheme launched in 2012.
The scheme provides invaluable support to young entrepreneurs who are looking to set up a small business – a group which often struggles to get business finance from other sources – and offers an effective pathway into employment, with almost a third of recipients aged 18-24 leaving unemployment thanks to this scheme.
Of all the loans distributed to entrepreneurs under 25, 39% have also gone to female business owners and 24% to business owners from ethnic minority backgrounds. Outside of London, the North West has received the highest volume of loans (1,992), followed by West Midlands (1,591) and the South East (1,291). London has received 3,099 loans in total since 2012.
Among those to receive one of these loans, the most popular industries to launch a business in include retail (£8.5m), hospitality (£5.8m) and arts and entertainment (£2.5m).
Access to finance is a key part of the refreshed Help to Grow Campaign, a one-stop shop for SMEs to find the information they need to start, scale up and grow their own business. The new site brings together the support on offer from the government into one place, making it quicker and more convenient to find the resources business leaders and budding entrepreneurs need to succeed.
Starting a business for the first time, particularly for younger entrepreneurs can be a daunting process. That’s why the government has also – for the first time ever – created a step-by-step guide on how to set up and grow a business in the UK as part of the Help to Grow website.
Small Business Minister Kevin Hollinrake said: “Every large firm started off as a small business and today’s aspiring young entrepreneurs could be the next success story. I urge them to explore how a Start Up Loan could launch their ambitions today.
“Through the British Business Bank, and the Help to Grow campaign, we’ve backed the next generation of business leaders with over £100 million in government backed finance and we’re not stopping there.”
The single biggest way we’re backing businesses is by creating the economic conditions for them to thrive, which is why the government is working hard to deliver on our priorities to halve inflation, grow the economy and cut debt. We’ve made significant progress and it’s clear the economy is turning a corner.
The government is also tackling a key issue affecting small firms – late payments. We are determined to make the UK the best place in the world to do business, which is why Minister Hollinrake launched the Prompt Payment and Cash Flow Review in 2023. Since the report was unveiled, we are looking at how to prosecute large firms who persistently and knowingly fail to adhere to the Payment Practice Reporting Regulations.
We’re also backing businesses through our £4.3 billion package to support SMEs with business rates, the Small Business Rates relief taking a third of properties out of paying rates completely, and extending the Retail, Hospitality and Leisure relief for a fifth year, we are helping businesses navigate challenging economic times.
Business owner Cory Hibbin, aged 20, is one of the recipients of a Start Up Loan. He took out a £14,500 loan in March 2023 to launch Techie Services. The company, based in Hastings, offers security solutions for residential clients, estates and corporate buildings, including CCTV, alarm systems and network management.
Cory doesn’t live with family or have any financial support from them so his aspiration of setting up Techie Services would not have been possible without the help of the bank’s funding.
He left school at 16 and started an apprenticeship as an IT engineer at a consultancy firm. After developing his skills, he started offering surveillance services on the side of this day job. The client was so impressed that they asked him to work for them full-time.
Cory, founder of Techie Services, said: “I’m not the sort of person who can take on learning from behind a desk so I left school at 16 to do an apprenticeship with a local IT consultancy company.
“While working there, I was working on the side in the evenings and at the weekends. Having been there for four years, I felt like I had gained enough experience to start my own company, which is when Techie Services began.
“I started with one large client, who quickly recommended me to other businesses and individuals, so I took on five new clients in our first six weeks.
I”t hasn’t been easy but it’s the best decision I’ve ever made. The money from Start Up Loans was invaluable in the success of the business – I used it to buy tools for installations as well as supplies for the office.
“While it might seem a big leap of faith to some people, you can’t let the fear of failure stop you from trying in the first place. I urge anyone 18 or above to look into the finance options available to them if they need a hand getting off the ground.”
Richard Bearman, Managing Director, Small Business Lending, British Business Bank said: “It’s amazing to see people in their late teens and early twenties with such ‘can-do’ attitudes and motivation to achieve success in working life.
“Our £100 million funding milestone is a significant landmark and testament to the hard work of Start Up Loans, ensuring anyone with a good business idea like Cory’s, no matter their age, has the access to the funding needed to bring it to life.
“The impact of this on communities across the UK has been huge and we’re determined to keep backing aspirational young people with money and mentoring.”
Heart Research UK Healthy Heart Tip, written by the Health Promotion and Education Team at Heart Research UK
Healthy Heart Tip: Benefits of physical activity on heart health
Physical inactivity is one of the main risk factors for heart diseases and is associated with a 24% higher risk of coronary heart disease.
In the UK, it is recommended that adults partake in at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity physical activity a week plus two sessions of resistance training.
Over six in 10 adults meet this guideline, if one of these is not you, then why not? Your heart is a muscle too!
This muscular organ also needs to be worked out and increasing the amount of physical activity you do is one of the best things for your heart health. In this healthy tip, we share some benefits of physical activity.
What is physical activity?
Physical activity is any form of movement produced by your muscles that uses energy. A few examples include walking, running, dancing, swimming, and gardening.
Heart health benefits
Partaking in physical activity strengthens your heart muscle and decreases your blood pressure. Regular physical activity can improve your blood sugar control and reduce your risk of developing type 2 diabetes, a major cardiovascular risk factor.
Changes in your cholesterol levels will become apparent, with your LDL (bad cholesterol) levels becoming lower and HDL (good cholesterol) levels rising.
Ultimately, physical activity is essential for a healthy heart. It strengthens your heart, reduces your chances of developing heart diseases and increases your lifespan.
Other health benefits
Physical activity benefits both your physical and mental health. If these are in good health, it is likely that your heart is too.
Partaking in regular physical activity will help you build cardiovascular endurance, muscular strength, and improve your flexibility and balance.
You may find that you have more energy after carrying out physical activity due to the rise in your endorphins, this also helps to improve your mood.
Other benefits include improvements in your sleep quality and duration, improvements in anxiety and depression as well as a reduction in the amount of stress hormones in your body.
These additional health benefits all directly or indirectly help your heart too.
