Driverless Trucks With a Dublin Connection

Local News

Dublin’s redistricting process may be over, but families are still wrestling with what the new boundaries will actually mean for their kids.

And here’s one of the harder questions: What happens when one child gets to stay at their current high school, but their younger brother or sister has to go somewhere else?

A group of parents asked the School Board Monday to allow younger siblings to stay with an older sibling when their high school years overlap, according to The Columbus Dispatch.

One of those families has a freshman at Jerome and a seventh grader at Eversole Run. Their home is moving into Coffman’s attendance area, which means the older son can stay at Jerome, but his younger brother will eventually have to attend Coffman.

And that’s where this gets hard. We’re not just talking about which building a child attends. There are friendships, sports, routines and years of connections wrapped up in a school. For parents, having children at two high schools can mean games and events happening at the same time in different places.

The older child can choose to move to the family’s newly assigned high school instead. But that means leaving the school where they’ve already begun building those connections.

The parents are asking for another option: let the younger sibling attend the older sibling’s high school when their years there overlap.

But there’s a difficult question on the district’s side too: where do you draw the line? The district says allowing sibling exceptions would make enrollment projections less predictable and could reduce some of the enrollment relief the redistricting was designed to provide. It also says other families could reasonably ask why their circumstances don’t qualify for an exception too.

For now, the district’s policy is that current high school students can remain at their existing school, but their younger siblings cannot follow them there simply because they’re siblings.

You can read the full Dispatch story here.

Local News

Here’s an easy one if you’re looking for something to do with the kids Sunday afternoon.

The Dublin Historical Society is offering free pony rides at the Coffman Homestead, along with free ice cream and a chance to explore the historic property.

The 1860s house, barn and schoolhouse will all be open, and there will be old-fashioned games and farm chores for kids to try too.

Everything is free, including the pony rides, which begin at 1:30 PM.

The Coffman Homestead is at 5200 Emerald Parkway, and the event runs Sunday from 1 to 3 PM.

Not a bad way to spend a couple of hours on a Sunday afternoon.

Local News

You may have heard about self-driving cars. But a Dublin company is helping test something considerably larger: self-driving semi trucks.

EASE Logistics, which is headquartered here in Dublin, has been working with the state on autonomous trucking projects across Ohio.

And some of the technology is getting surprisingly far along.

EASE has put about 3,000 miles on trucks using what’s called “platooning,” where one truck follows another and automatically steers, accelerates and brakes along with the lead truck. A human still sits in the second truck as a backup, but an EASE executive told Signal Statewide that the technology is capable of operating without that second driver.

And if you happen to see these trucks on the highway, there’s something unusual to look for: purple lights. They illuminate when the trucks are operating in platooning mode so law enforcement knows they’re digitally connected.

But EASE is also testing something that goes a step further.

At its warehouses in Marysville, trucks are already moving actual cargo without drivers at all.

These are different vehicles developed by Swedish company Einride. They’re electric, travel at about 15 mph on a short route around the warehouses and don’t even have traditional cabs for someone to sit in. A remote operator monitors them and can intervene if necessary.

For now, their use is limited. But EASE wants to eventually test the driverless trucks on a nearby 45 mph road or even U.S. 33. And putting fully autonomous trucks onto public roads more broadly would require changes to Ohio law.

So if self-driving trucks eventually become a normal sight on American highways, some of the work getting them there is happening through a company headquartered right here in Dublin.