mrCharlie

Acclimation is a factor. 94% of households in Ohio have some form of air conditioning, it's a bit of a shock for teachers and students alike to go sit in a warm and stuffy building for half the day when you just aren't used to it. Say what you will about the environmental impacts of that, but not too many people (beyond the Amish) are particularly interested in going back to days before A/C. I'll also second what others have said about building design and construction being a factor. The primary school I went to was built in the 1920's, I don't recall it being particularly bad on hot days. Intermediate through high school were 1950's-1960's buildings complete with lower ceilings and windowless interior rooms. The floor fans didn't help, and those were the days before refillable water bottles - hydration to cool down was a few seconds at the water fountain. Those were just miserable places to be on warm days, let alone be expected to concentrate.

Had our first experience riding Amtrak last week on vacation, riding from Providence to Boston South Station and back. It's a trip we drove many times when we lived up there, as well as taking the MBTA commuter train once. We were only in Boston for the afternoon, so not exactly the most economical way (at $83 round trip) for three people to make the trip - but taking the train was also kind of the point. This level of service, or really any service at all would be ideal for our semi-yearly long weekend trip from Columbus to Chicago. The lack of hassle and not paying for parking would easily pay for itself. We took the Acela (business class) on the way up, Northeast Regional (coach) on the way back. We got to PVD too early - probably subconscious "get to the airport early" behavior. Both trains were right on schedule, and despite the Acela equipment being near replacement we were very impressed how nice and comfortable it was. The NE Regional was fine as well, both were orders of magnitude more comfortable than a plane. Both trains were very full, so the reserved seating on the Acela was nice to be sure the three of us could sit together. We made sure to board the Regional as soon as possible to ensure we sat together. Per the speedometer app on my phone (and much to our son's amusement), we saw top speeds of 150 mph on the Acela, 125 on the Regional. The Acela hid its speed better, particularly tilting through the turns. Ignoring the overhead of waiting at the station, what would have been a miserable 1-1.5 hour drive was done stress-free in about 35 and 45 minutes - with stops at Back Bay and Route 128.

I was a wondering the fate of the 1880's rail depot on the site. The depot apparently came from Brice, and was rebuilt on-side (clearly wasn't exactly original with the location). I assume someone will make the effort to relocate it, assuming it was preserved enough to be worth rebuilding. Apparently also a few passenger cars and a locomotive on-site. https://www.dispatch.com/story/news/local/northwest/2017/08/14/rail-museum-event-center-depot/19688939007/ Otherwise seems like a good reuse for the site, walkable (for those brave enough to cross Kenny) to Japan Marketplace.

That makes a lot of sense. When we lived there in the mid-2000's, plenty of people commuted to Columbus, and some OU faculty lived in or near Columbus. It would be much easier now too. The Lancaster bypass opened while we lived there, Nelsonville was in planning stages, and nowadays at least some jobs would allow for remote days.

We switched internet to Windstream DSL (since upgraded to fiber) in 2015 because it had much better upload speeds, important for WfH. Our Time Warner bundled price was already not great since we used a TiVo/cable card instead of their garbage cable box. We stuck with that for not even a year before buying an AppleTV and going all streaming, it was quite the wonderful day giving them their flaky equipment back. We did have Hulu Live and Sling on and off for a few years to wean us off a few then cable-only shows, but even those are long gone. We don't really watch sports and have been time-shifting our shows for years, so its been a very easy transition.

Bus service between Newark and Granville, including a stop at Denison, coming in October: https://news.yahoo.com/bus-between-newark-granville-including-100324302.html I recall hearing discussion about fixed route busses (finally) coming to Licking County, but I didn't realize they already started service along Main St in Newark. Unfortunately it does look like getting downtown (or to the groceries on 21st) requires a transfer at Tamarack...and no bus routes to Columbus yet. But it's a start.

We have both (had the hybrid first), its a perfect two-car garages since both are great at different things. The real shame is that plug-in hybrids aren't more popular. Something with about 40 miles of range would be sufficient for most people's daily needs, with the ability to travel indefinitely on gasoline for long trips. These also help with constrained battery manufacturing capacity, since the batteries in one EV can make several plug-ins. On the other hand, a conventional hybrid is lighter and generally better to drive. That lightness also gets you a few more MPG on long trips, once the battery is depleted. A standard hybrid or plug-in also has the same maintenance needs as any ICE car. It's a very weird feeling with our i4 knowing the only maintenance is rotating the tires ever 10k miles, and charging the brake fluid every two years. We spend around $12/month charging so far.

Ohio announced 27 new EV chargers along highways: https://ohiocapitaljournal.com/2023/07/17/state-officials-announce-27-ev-charging-stations-along-ohio-freeways/?fbclid=IwAR1sQNVwgGmA3WJvE--RfoN-Q5KoRkipSU58NoYrPamBwPU_IkxCgdqQOro Glad to see this happening, especially along I-71. While our EV will easily make the the monthly trek from Granville to Cincinnati, it's still makes us a bit nervous knowing we have to rely on two Electrify America stations to make it back home the same day. Having more options is nice, especially long trips. Now West Virginia needs to get its act together. There are several 62kW chargers along US 33 in Ohio - while okay, some higher-powered options would be nice. West Virginia by comparison has a total of THREE non-Tesla 62kW chargers in central/western parts of the state - and nothing faster than that. We considered taking the EV to Asheville earlier this year, the only way to make it would have been via Cincinnati. If we take the EV to Washington next month, it will have to be via Pennsylvania.

Oof I forgot just how bad that section of trail was for that very reason, I recall more than one skidding stop because an oncoming kid with oblivious parents crossed the line in front of me. Consequently we are extremely vigilant about making sure our son rides safely (and pays attention) on the trail that is local to me, but it's NOWHERE near as busy as downtown Loveland. Also not as long, scenic, or interesting.

Excellent news. I haven't ridden that trail in close to 20 years, but even then I always hated dealing with that intersection. Worse than even downtown Loveland. I'm sure it's gotten much worse, the cartridge factory was basically abandoned then.

Funny you mention Columbus Academy. My wife and I looked at an absolutely incredible, high quality, architect-designed time capsule house from the 1970's in the woods just north of Pataskala five or so years ago. Though the opposite of urban, the house itself was pretty much everything we could ever want. It was right at the top of our budget at the time, and per our realtor would have been double in Granville...because it was in Licking Heights Schools. Conspicuously on the coffee table was then-current-Guide to Private Schools book, despite the owners being retirees. We asked our realtor if we could include 13 years of Columbus Academy tuition as a contingency. Interesting thought about the chicken and egg problem for future secular schools - if this takes hold, maybe those will start to appear where demand is sufficient. Though I haven't come across any high-quality charter high schools, so maybe they are more aiming to just be a bit better than CCS, rather than drawing people back from the suburbs. I'm not sure if this would somehow led to different results. Our kid starts first grade in the fall, while it's a possible for a decent private city high school established and prove themselves to be of quality before we would need them - but I doubt it. Still, I consistently support programs that aim to solve problems we have personally experienced (ie single payer insurance) even if we will no longer benefit. To clarify, I do agree that most parents sending their kids to religious schools are doing what they sincerely feel is best for their children (that said, my friend whose parents sent hime to Catholic schools for K-12 doesn't entire agree). I was cynically getting more at the likely motivations of our state legislature, who have shown more interest in sucking up to conservative voters and sticking it to the libs than doing anything that might benefit Ohio's children. One more thought - if our state is now providing money for parents to send their children to private religious schools, perhaps we stop trying to inject religious morality into our public schools. Parents who don't want their kids learning that LGBTQ people exist and should be treated, but do think all kids should pray at school and learn the ten commandments now have a state-sponsored choice.

I'm really torn about this. First and foremost, I'm a strong supporter of public schools, and hate to see anything that might harm or deny resources (or even "the better" students) from them. We have precedent for skepticism in Ohio with the mostly-failed charter school program. Given everything else out state legislature has been up to lately, I think there is about a 1% chance this is being done in the interest of what is best for this kids. It's mostly to make it more affordable for religious (conservative) parents to send their kids to religion-based schools, send public money to said schools, and maybe do a little damage to the ("liberal") public schools in the process. On the other hand, I went to school 12 miles from home at a tiny, low-quality rural district in the exurbs of Cincinnati. With the silly way the districts were drawn, we were two miles from a much larger, much better suburban district as well as a few decent Catholic schools. My parents couldn't really afford the full cost of Catholic schools, and open enrollment wasn't a thing back then. It would have been nice to have some options. I also think about - going back to what @Gramaryesaid - what this could *potentially* do for urbanism. Even though we are largely-happy with the micro-urbanism of Granville and the excellent school system our son is attending, we've been tempted many times to make the move to Columbus proper (for multiple reasons). One of the biggest challenges is to live somewhere much more urban than where we are now generally means Columbus City Schools, and they seem to be of mixed quality at best. Often decent elementarys, but so-so middle schools, and terrible high schools unless you get into a good magnet school. While we could afford private school if he didn't get picked in the magnet school lottery down the road, the unknown quantity of tuition isn't especially appealing. Knowing we wouldn't necessarily be paying the full cost might make a difference. Realistically though, we have practically zero interest in sending our kid to any sort of religious school, and there aren't very many private options beyond those - which brings us back to what the bill is actually trying to accomplish.

A lot of states already send car owners substantial once-yearly bills with personal property excise taxes on vehicles, based on blue book value or some other formula. We discovered this fact when we moved to Pawtucket, RI for a year in 2009 - tax rate there was something like $53/year per $1000 of assessed value, and varied by town/city. We had two fairly new cars, and had to pay a (surprise) bill of over $2000. Nowadays having one hybrid and one EV in our fleet, I'm not a big fan of the extra annual registration fees Ohio currently asks for. I also get it, though I don't think our state legislature was primarily concerned about paying for roads when imposing these fee. An annual per-mile tax, with a multiplier for GVWR since heavier vehicles make a bigger impact on roads, seems a lot more fair. If done right, the fees should be roughly comparable to what gets paid annually in state gas taxes for a comparable ICE vehicle. Hybrids should pay a portion of that, especially plug-in hybrids. It gets complicated though, the advantage of taxing at the pump is at least some of those miles are being driven in Ohio - what about EV/hybrid owners who travel extensively? Or eliminate the gas tax entirely, raise state income taxes and pay for roads out of the general fund. Though that seems unfair as well...

Just tell them it might hurt the suburbs and help the cities...

Ouch - 27/53. I probably used to know most of these at one time, I guess that's what I get for moving out of the area 20 years ago. Not having major roads or highways made this WAY harder.

My car shows database speed limits on the GPS screen, and also uses a camera to read speed limits signs, displaying them on the dashboard. It's interesting seeing the limitations of each approach, which sometimes display conflicting numbers. GPS speed is limited to the accuracy of the database. It's usually pretty good, but doesn't know about things like construction zones. At least in my experience, recent factory GPS systems are pretty smart - usually they know what lane you are in, displaying the wrong road is almost never a problem (maybe around big buildings, steep mountains, construction zones, or weird instances like Lower Wacker Drive in Chicago). The sign reader handles construction zones just fine, except the new variable speed ones. However, it always reads school zones as 20 mph regardless of time of day, and occasionally reads other signs as the speed limit (exit for Township Road 80 = 80 mph speed limit). I'm sure both of these technologies could be tweaked/prioritized if the result had impact beyond being informational. There is a also a fair amount of precedent for geofencing vehicle features that could carry over to how speed limiters operate - for instance, some self-driving capabilities only work on highways or other major roads. I feel like acceptance would be probably be better if the limiter was more a percentage than absolute - even allowing +20% over the speed limit would be better than it is now. There also probably needs to be a way to occasionally override the limiter for emergencies. I can think of a handful of times I've felt justified (not sure if a cop would agree) exceeding the speed limit - medical emergencies (including veterinary), or sprinting past a truck dropping gravel or someone who keeps drifting out of their lane. Perhaps if the emergency room is programmed into the GPS the limiter would be disabled (limited to one use per week), or maybe the limiter can be occasionally overridden for some short period of time in appropriate places (60 seconds total per hour, highway only).

It does seem like downtown Newark should have an 8-10 story building somewhere... http://wiki.lickingcountylibrary.info/Central_Trust

Looks like someone is bringing back part of the old St Rt 157 proposal, which has been on the table in some form since the 1960's. I'm not sure I really see it happening - there are a lot of rather nice existing neighborhoods along that path - but it would certainly open up the far north end of Newark for growth. I'm also not sure how I feel about that, since it would probably end up mostly being SFH sprawl - a bit unfortunate when Newark has such a solid urban core, I'd much rather see that continue to be revitalized (which may happen anyway). Can't argue though that area north of Newark has some accessibility problems, and this would help. The original Rt 157 plan was for a divided, limited access road from I-70 to at least Mt Vernon, following Thornwood Drive in the southern portion. There were changes made over the years, limiting it to just the portion south of 16 before ultimately canceling the project in favor (presumably) of 16/37/161. It got far enough along ODOT acquired some land for the project, part of what helped the Thrownwood Connector project happen pretty quickly. I posted more detail earlier this year in a different topic:

Also 17/17 and 35/42. Several NE Ohio counties took more than one try. I might have been able to get most everything south of I-70, but NW Ohio would probably be mostly red.

Heath is unfortunately Newark's sprawl, with all the negatives that entails. I'm pretty happy it feels like Newark's downtown is thriving once again, and it's good to see Heath is recognizing the lack of focus and identity. Indian Mound mall on the other hand doesn't exactly seem healthy, not unlike a lot of other smaller malls - especially now that it's pretty easy to just go to Easton or Polaris if you want the real mall experience. If the mall ever goes under, assuming the downtown development is popular and successful perhaps it could take over the mall property all the way to 30th Street.

The worst decision I made in my college education was trying to work enough to avoid getting student loans. I was in a highly-competitive program at a state school right before Bob Taft started cutting higher-ed funding, and lived at home to save money on room and board. I should have taken the hint when pretty much all of my classmates either took out loans or had parents helping pay for things, though I did not have that luxury. I was extremely burnt out after my first year, having essentially zero days off, and started dropping electives/requirements (that had to be made up later) since it was the only was to barely keep up with the coursework for my major. I eventually gave in and got minimal loans to cover tuition. By my pre-junior year, it was obvious even working weekends was eating up time I needed to be spending on schoolwork - so I quit my job, and got enough loans to help cover the expenses that went beyond what I saved up in co-op quarters. There is a point at which you can only be so financially responsible, sometimes stuff just costs what it costs. Students loans were a good investment and literally the only way I was able to finish school, and I've worked in my field since graduation.

The current high-demand for workers in the trades will no doubt divert some kids from college. Good-paying jobs right out of high school, without student debt. The catch is you'll probably be working for someone forever (which is fine for a lot of people). A well-chosen college degree is certainly helpful if you want to some day run your own business, not to mention our health insurance system making it very difficult to work for yourself. The trades though are not for everyone. There are also a lot of entry-level white collar jobs that (often inappropriately) require a college degree, though regardless the lack of a degree probably limits how far you will actually go in your career. There are also definitely blue-collar jobs that do require a postsecondary degree, and some colleges are working to fulfill that need (OSU offering a BS in Engineering Technology, ideally for people who want a career at Intel and such). Regardless, there will still be plenty of demand and messaging that a college education is necessary for a lot of people, not to mention mention the millions of Americans who already have plenty of student debt. Something needs to happen so younger people can actually get started on their lives.

I don't know if it's being actively considered (it should be), but what about if we just made student loans 0% interest moving forward? Maybe even rolled back existing loans to whatever was originally borrowed? It's not really a giveaway, people would still be paying back everything they borrowed - but maybe they will get them paid off at some point. It also wouldn't be hitting the economy all at the same time the way blanket forgiveness would. I feel like we need to do something, student loan debt is having genuine long-term consequences to our country. Student loan debt has been cited as a factor for declining birth rates (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5231614/) and declining home ownership (https://www.federalreserve.gov/publications/files/consumer-community-context-201901.pdf) amount younger people.

Ouch - imagine being a campaign manager having to put a positive spin on that.

I still have a few of those stickers. I'm afraid to use them, because once I do I'll never be able to sell that car.