Porty Podcast

Send us Fan Mail The Portobello Community Hub at Bellfield depends on volunteers. Some of them get involved with single projects, other make a regular long term commitment, or even just offer to help as needed. The tasks they take on vary from being Action Porty Board members, to assisting at events, gardening or helping to maintain the building, etc. To help manage this army of committed individu...

Send us Fan Mail Portobello is a magic place - quite literally! In Richard Wiseman, we have a magician whose videos on YouTube have spell-bound people from around the world (over 600 million times he says). He’s performed at the Fringe and was a Fringe Festival Director. He’s also fascinated by the history of magic and Portobello’s rich history in this wonderful art. And that’s the story he’ll tel...

Send us Fan Mail A new play for schools is about to start touring over the next couple of months. It’s called ‘Maya and the Whale’ and it stars Hazel Darwin-Clements who also wrote it. The production is part of a programme run by Theatre in Schools Scotland. The organisation works with teachers, education colleagues, local authority arts organisations to develop an education values the enjoyment o...

Send us Fan Mail Thinking back to the Festive Season, cosmetics appear to have been popular gifts. And soap is one of those products that seems to have to ability to keep on giving throughout the year – or rather, good quality soaps. If you do your shopping in Portobello, you may never have come across a small shop at the eastern end of Joppa Road. Dook produces artisan soaps which it sells all ov...

Send us Fan Mail There will shortly be an unusual dance event in Porty.  It’s called the Malecon Matinee and will be held next Sunday afternoon. What’s behind the name? Well, it’s the creation of local people who’ve fallen in love with the music and dance of Cuba – and the Malecon is the main road along the sea front in Havana. But what is different and special about this music and dance? David Ca...

Send us Fan Mail Happy New Year and welcome back to another season of The Porty Podcast. Have you ever walked along Porty Prom and watched the open-water swimmers on a cold January day braving the freezing air before walking into the cold sea? There’s a bit of madness on New Year’s Day when the ‘Loony Dook’ takes place; but to keep going throughout the month despite most weather conditions takes s...

Send us Fan Mail It may only be the second week of December but the Porty Podcast is taking an extended break until the New Year. However, it’s been an interesting year. Both Hazel Darwin-Clements and David Calder have met lots of interesting people with interesting stories to tell. So we thought we should look back on some of the best bits of the last 12 months. Thanks to everyone who took part a...

Send us Fan Mail Today, we meet the last of the four councillors we elected back in May. Conservative Tim Jones mounted a tightly focused campaign here in Portobello. He wanted to see the re-opening of Brunstane Road, the removal of some of the Spaces for People protected cycle lanes, and to stop the introduction of a controlled parking zone. When he spoke to David Calder this week, he stressed th...

Send us Fan Mail In this the third of our interviews with our local councillors, I’ve been speaking to Alys Mumford from the Scottish Green Party. The Greens had a particularly successful election, doubling their numbers from five to ten. All of the councillors I’ve spoken to so far have been deeply concerned about climate change and about the current economic and social crises facing the country...

Send us Fan Mail You may have heard that Lothian Dance Academy is under new management. For the last thirty-three years, Miss Morag – Morag Philips – has been the driving force behind the school. But before that, she had a thriving career, travelling the world in a wide range of shows including ballet and cabaret. However, as David Calder found out when he met Miss Morag yesterday afternoon, the s...

Send us Fan Mail As we know, the new council has been in place for almost six months. Three of our elected members are new to the role. So how are they settling into the job? In this second episode, Porty podcast Producer David Calder met Labour’s Jane Meagher

Send us Fan Mail Many homes in Portobello date back to the Victorian or Edwardian eras. Those in the centre of Edinburgh are much, much older than that. They were fit for purpose in those days – but, with climate change a growing issue along with ever increasing energy prices, they are no longer energy efficient. We could either pull them all down and lose all the architectural heritage that makes...

Send us Fan Mail There have been posters appearing around Portobello advertising the screening of a film called "Rory's Way" starring Brian Cox. It's the first step in the path towards creating a local community film club here. It's a project which David Calder discovered when he met Monica Birch, a member of the organising group, has been fermenting for some months.

Send us Fan Mail The new council has been in place for almost six months, so how are the new councillors settling into the job. Three of them were elected for the first time back in May and, in this short series between now and the end of the year, we’ll hear from them all. In this first interview, Porty podcast Producer David Calder met Kate Campbell from the SNP.

Send us Fan Mail There's just over a week to go before the crowd fund closes. https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/p/trudy-me-a-picture-book-celebrating-difference

Send us Fan Mail Physical disabilities can be very frustrating. It can lead to a loss of confidence, to the feeling that your boundaries are much more limited. For those who depend on a wheelchair, many come to think they’ve somehow become less visible; when out with a partner, even friends may address their comments to the partner and not to the person in the chair. However, they have also found...

Send us Fan Mail Scotland’s architectural heritage is well known and respected. The large number of tenements you find all over the Central Belt in particular is an important part of that. But therein lies a problem. Who is responsible for looking after them? Each flat is separately owned. Neighbours nowadays do not always know each other. Some are owner-occupied; others are let. It’s a question t...

Send us Fan Mail There’s a beautiful picture book for children called ‘Trudy and Me – a Picture Book Celebrating Difference’. Its heroine is a young girl, Trudy - born with Downs Syndrome, and her relationship with her brother Patrick as they play on the beach at Portobello. The book however is waiting for a crowdfunder campaign, which will come to an end at the end of this month, before it can go...

Send us Fan Mail It was fascinating to meet Lisi Angerer, an Austrian student, currently studying in the Netherlands, who has an ambition to write her PhD about Portobello Central.

Send us Fan Mail Today saw an interesting example of inter-community collaboration The Northfield and Willowbrae Community Council hosted an Environment Fair at the Northfield Community Centre. However, a lot of groups from Portobello were quite prominent as podcast producer David Calder found this afternoon.   https://www.northfieldandwillowbrae.org.uk/ https://www.ourfutureedinburgh.org/ https:/...

Send us Fan Mail This week’s episode is a little unusual. During the pandemic, we became used to seeing empty trains passing beneath the railway bridges nearby. Since things have improved, Governments around Europe and rail companies have done their best to persuade us back. Ok, the strikes here haven't exactly helped. But in Germany, the federal Government decided to introduce a cut price fa...

Send us Fan Mail On Monday evening, a large group of people gathered in the Wash House for the first ever AGM for Porty central, now that it’s formally a charitable organisation – a SCIO, a Scottish Charitable Incorporated Organisation. All going well, it will take over the running or Portobello Town Hall when all of the current works are completed and the scaffolding taken down. The plan is that...

Send us Fan Mail The Portobello Book Festival is back and this year... back to normal. It starts on the 29th of September and runs until the 2nd of October. Almost all of the events this year (with a couple of exceptions) will be held at the library, though, as David Calder found out, there is a curious extra - a literary walking tour around the town! https://portobellobookfestival.com

Send us Fan Mail You may have noticed the new wine bar on the High Street, intriguingly called Smith and Gertrude. It opened a couple of months ago; and it's an expansion of the business that's been operating successfully in Stockbridge. David Calder wanted to know more and find out how they didn't just survive but thrive through the pandemic.  https://smithandgertrude.com/  

Send us Fan Mail Earlier this year, we heard from actor Cal McAninch about the Porty team taking on the Atlantic Challenge. Well, Atlantic Body and Soul have been training hard and tackling longer and longer trips (you may have seen photographs on social media of their week-long  expedition around the West Coast of Scotland) in preparation for the event in December. David Calder met two of the cre...