Police are appealing for information following a robbery in Granton Mains. The incident happened around 12.10pm yesterday (Wednesday, 16 September) at the West Granton Community Shop (Sandy’s).
A man entered the shop, brandished a weapon at a member of staff and stole a four-figure sum of cash.
The suspect is described as white, with facial hair. He was wearing a cap, dark top, bottoms and trainers and a black face mask.
Detective Sergeant Gavin Howat said: “Thankfully no-one was injured during this incident but the staff member was left shaken. We believe the man was waiting in the vicinity prior to the incident.
“Enquiries into the incident are ongoing and I would ask anyone who recognises the description of the suspect to come forward immediately.
“We are appealing for anyone who saw anything suspicious or has any information which may be able to assist to get in touch.”
Anyone with any information is asked to contact police on 101 quoting incident 1403 of 16 September.
North Edinburgh’s COVID-19 Food Share Consortium has produced a second newsletter.
The limited print run eight page publication will initially be distributed through the Group’s food distribution network and will also be available at local projects and offices.
For further information please email northedinnews@gmail.com
Lottery boost for Friends of Granton Castle Walled Garden
The Friends’ group’s Gillean Paterson explained: “We received £10,000 from the National Lottery to match fund the grant from The Robertson Trust.
“The money is specifically to employ a Community Project Development Officer for one year to put in place plans for the garden.
“These include more community veg growing, a green gym, planting a miniforest to increase biodiversity, longer opening times – and that’s just to begin with!”
The small Scottish charity Edinburgh Direct Aid has deployed a team of carpenters and other construction workers, trained in their vocational training depot in Arsal, Lebanon, to repair windows and doors destroyed by the recent blast in Beirut port.
Maggie Tookey, EDA’s international aid director, has arrived in Beirut to lead and plan the work. EDA is one of the very few NGO’s, so far, to begin actual repair work.
For over 6 years Edinburgh Direct Aid has been helping 50,000 Syrian refugees in Arsal, a small Lebanese town high above the Bekaa valley, near the Syrian border. All this aid has been passing through Beirut.
Now EDA has brought a team of Syrian refugees from Arsal to Beirut to carry out emergency repairs after the explosion at the port on August 4th. The team is drawn from graduates of construction courses at EDA’s vocational training centre in Arsal, which are run in partnership with the German “Green Helmets” organisation.
EDA and Green Helmets, are working together in Karantina, a poor residential area of Beirut near the port. Many living in this area have lost not only friends & family, but also their jobs at the port, & have suffered heavy damage to their houses.
While many NGOs in Beirut are providing food & medical supplies, or carrying out damage assessment, the EDA – Green Helmets team is one of very few (so far) actually working to shore up & repair houses.
The team brought with them woodworking & other machinery from Arsal, now set up in a marquee on some nearby waste ground, & is using its specialised skills to make & replace doors & windows & their frames as needed, & to carry out other repairs to ensure the traumatised local people have shelter.
Working conditions are grim. The need for precautions against coronavirus is ever prevalent; the midsummer heat is relentless; access to supplies & communications in the city is erratic.
MAGGIE TOOKEY, Edinburgh Direct Aid’s international projects director, is leading the team in Beirut. OnWednesday, she wrote from the scene:
“Beirut is complete chaos. It feels to have lost all its spirit but the strength of the continuing protests seem to belie that. Maybe it’s the depth of anger that everyone seems to hold, apparent in everyone I speak to about how the explosion and the economic collapse came to pass. The city seems to have no guidance and no authority to control anything. It’s almost lawless despite the state of emergency and the presence of the Lebanese army on the streets.
“Traffic congestion is the worst I’ve ever known. It takes me almost 2 hours to get to our work site near the port – a distance of 6 kilometres. I’ve now measured it. The army closes roads at random. Inside the city, thousands of volunteers are sweeping up glass and masonry and endless streams of small trucks come to take it away, choking up the narrow streets even more. Much of it gets left – swept into big piles in any corner behind houses and kiosks, probably destined to remain there for months/years.
Maggie’s ‘office’
“The port area which I pass every day, is a sort of Ground Zero. Nothing is recognisable in the blast area. A desert of twisted metal overlooked by huge and ruined silo towers, still standing but spilling out their contents to form a grain mountain.
“People come to stare in the evening when it’s cooler. They come from all over Lebanon taking selfies and endless pictures of the disaster. They come in big 4 wheel drive cars, blocking the roads and preventing those of us trying to get to work. It’s very hard not to get out and yell at them when stuck at a chaotic road intersection for 20 minutes unable to move. The police are useless. They do nothing. They’ve given up.
“The blast was terrifying. 50% of the force went out to sea towards Cyprus. The other 50% went deep into the city. God only knows what would have happened had the blast not been on a small peninsula by the sea.
“Karantina is an area of roughly 1 sq km, the nearest part being less then 500 meters from the epicentre of the blast. The community is mostly poor Lebanese and a few Syrian families. EDA, along with our partners, the Green Helmets, have set up a carpentry workshop with machinery brought from our base in Arsal and a team of EDA refugees trained in setting up shelters and repairing housing in Arsal.
“The workshop is on a patch of rough land by several blocks of 3/4 storey flats which have all suffered damage. As with many buildings the explosion blasted out windows and doors.
“There’s also some structural damage: we have an engineer in our team to check possible problems. Many men in these families are port workers; some were killed or injured and most have lost friends in the explosion.
“The team is making window frames, door frames on site in the makeshift workshop and every night, 2 of the team take turns in sleeping there to guard the valuable, rented machinery. We have a target of 200 windows but of course the need is endless. We will see how the project plays out in terms of funding. Right now it’s hot, hard, noisy work but the residents are delighted to get our help.
Meanwhile in Beirut the protests continue; sometimes the army fires off their guns to clear the streets which causes alarm when it’s close by.”
Edinburgh Direct Aid initial target is to repair 100 apartments at a cost of around $10,000. With more cash we could do much more, to help out not only with repairs in Beirut, but also in mitigation of the terrible effects of the hyper-inflation & lock down in Arsal.
To help pay for this work by refugees making some repayment for the sanctuary they have received from a desperately beleaguered country, donations can be made, please, at:
What If…North Edinburgh? (WINE) is a programme run by First Port to support local people to develop social enterprises to create jobs and do something worthwhile in the community. Run by the manager, Julie Smith, it has assisted people over the last year to start up businesses doing sewing and tailoring, running markets and making crafts.
WINE offers workshops, training and discussions on various topics from ‘what is a social enterprise’ to managing your finances. It started a digital training course for local people just before lockdown, to include things like using social media, creating your own posters, how to sell online. That had to stop, but Julie is keen to offer training, this time online. She wants to know what would be useful for people.
“I got a really good tutor in from an organisation called Mhor Collective”, Julie explained. “They do a lot of work around what people want to learn, their motivation etc and don’t just have a set course they deliver. It’s tailored to people’s needs.
“Since lockdown, we’ve all seen how important having access to the internet it. But it’s hard if you can’t afford broadband or data – and if you have to share one tablet or phone between a whole family. I know a lot of people will have been doing home schooling too online, a very new thing for everybody!
“I’m doing a survey of people in north Edinburgh to find out what they’d like to learn to do, or do better using technology. We can then put on a course based on those needs. It’ll be great to build on the skills people already have and maybe identify some digital champions locally who can then go on to support others.”
The survey is straightforward and shouldn’t take too long.
“It’s important we get as many views from as many people as possible. If you need a paper copy of the survey, let me know. And pass it on to others!’’
Police are appealing for information after thieves broke into Edinburgh College Forthside building on West Shore Road, sometime between Wednesday 1 July and Wednesday 8 July.
Hand and desktop power tools valued between £30,000 and £40,000 were stolen from the College’s Construction Centre for Excellence.
Detective Inspector Kevin Tait said : ‘The building is a training facility for students to train in the professions of bricklaying roofing and joinery.
“Enquiries are currently ongoing into the break-in and we would ask anyone with anyone information to contact Police Scotland on 101, quoting 962 of Wednesday 8 July’.
