Welcome to Wednesday.

☀️ Today's weather: Mostly sunny, high around 80.

⏪ On this day in 1912, Columbus kicked off a weeklong celebration of its centennial with a 100-gun salute and a Statehouse fireworks display.

Today's newsletter is 1,079 words — a 4-minute read.

Usage of rentable scooters and bikes is stabilizing in Columbus, but the city and its partners are still trying to make their presence on streets and sidewalks less disruptive.

Why it matters: Cities like Columbus encourage the alternatives to car travel, but are still grappling with safety and logistics.

State of play: Ridership dropped between 2024 and 2025 after the city entered into an exclusivity agreement with a pair of vendors.

• It's up slightly compared to last year, but there are still kinks to be worked out.

Catch up quick: Until the beginning of 2025, micromobility companies offered shared device services with little accountability.

• A five-year agreement made Veo and Spin Columbus' exclusive operators, also establishing fines, new rules and a revenue sharing agreement that made more fiscal sense for the city.
• This replaced the likes of Lime, Bird and CoGo bicycles.

In the first year, results were mixed.

• Riders liked the new options, and Columbus leaders felt the agreements gave them more power to enforce rules.
• But total trips on all devices dropped 19%. People still complained about them littering the public right-of-way, and vendors didn't follow through on promises to distribute their fleets to different neighborhoods.

This year, ridership appears to be holding steady or slightly improving.

• The city logged about 386,000 trips through July compared to about 370,000 through that point last year, mobility and parking division administrator Justin Goodwin tells Axios.

📍 Zoom in: Goodwin says "the biggest change" has been adjusting the usage restrictions in the Short North.

• For years, the city had "a complete no-ride zone policy" for that area.
• This summer, it's experimented with a "more nuanced solution" that allows for riding on High Street but not on sidewalks. Goodwin says officials will continue tweaking.

Friction point: The same old issue still plagues the industry — discarded scooters are annoying and in the way.

• Goodwin says "good progress" has been made, but the city and companies are still working to add corrals and tighten requirements around devices blocking sidewalks and ADA access.

The big picture: Likely more impactful than any micromobility issue is the city's Bike Plus plan, approved at the end of 2024.

• That plan resulted in nearly 16 miles of built or in-progress bike lanes last year.
• The city's longest protected bike lane opened along 4th Street this year.

A new exhibition at Ohio State digs into the university's archives to explore the way alternative and subversive publications create communities and movements.

What's inside: "Scrap Paper: Belonging & Resistance" opened this week, showcasing decades of zines, punk show posters, political pamphlets and other materials that had been in OSU's cavernous Rare Books & Manuscripts Library.

The big picture: At first glance, you might wonder why a collection of posters and DIY magazines is worth a visit — but the exhibition draws a line between these community-building works and real cultural impact.

• "Community breeds art, art brings in communities and that's how movements start," says art and design librarian Courtney Hunt.

Case in point: One section showcases early feminist publications, some published at OSU.

• Another features cartoneras — handmade Latin American publications that combine art, news and history to spread messages and recruit people to political activism.

The bottom line: You're likely to find something fascinating and connected to your own life, whether you're a former punk kid, a lover of zine culture, a political activist or just someone who appreciates DIY art.

• "Hopefully people come in and engage with this stuff and realize that it's not that far from them," says ethnic studies librarian Leticia Wiggins.

📍 Stop by: The free exhibit is open 10am-5pm weekdays, 11am-5pm weekends at OSU's Thompson Library.

A bench trial is underway for Bruce Foster III, the man charged with murdering two people during a 2025 mass shooting inside a New Albany warehouse. (WCMH-TV)

🤝 Grove City Council is working with petitioners on compromise regarding large-scale data center development, after tabling a vote last week on a November ballot measure.

• They have until Sept. 4 to place it on the ballot. (Dispatch)

🏗️ Construction has started on an apartment partnership between Columbus State Community College and Woda Cooper that will offer 166 affordable units near campus by 2028. (Columbus Business First 🔒)

• A recent profile dubbed the college "downtown's busiest developer."

👋 Alissa here. When I heard the news that country music icon Dolly Parton had died, I didn't think about her songs. I thought about her books.

Why it matters: Parton's Imagination Library has sent free books to children worldwide since she launched the program 31 years ago.

• That includes over 400,000 Ohio children, the recipients of nearly 28 million books and counting.

I signed up my 2-year-old son when he was just a few days old. Now he checks the mailbox with me and looks forward to cracking open his new "Dolly book" every month.

• Parton's philanthropy has resulted in countless memories, like learning nursery rhymes with the Very Hungry Caterpillar. It's also helped us find new favorites, like "Buffalo Fluffalo."
• I also have her to thank (or blame?) for the hours spent with "Llama Llama Red Pajama."
• Her program has helped inspire a love of books that will last long after the deliveries stop.

Fun fact: Ohio has the highest Imagination Library participation of any state, with over 60% of eligible children enrolled and all counties on board.

• In Franklin County, around 45,000 kids are enrolled.

Flashback: Parton visited Columbus in 2022 to celebrate the program's success. Inspired by her father's inability to read and write, she called it "one of the greatest things that I've ever done in my life."

The bottom line: "I'll be as proud of this as anything I've ever done," she said. "When they lay me down, I'll be thinking of the Imagination Library."

Sign up your child to receive books until their 5th birthday or donate to the cause in Parton's memory.

Thanks to Tyler Buchanan for editing today's newsletter.

Our picks:

📚 Alissa is going to read a couple extra bedtime stories tonight.

💔 Andrew signed up his daughter for the Imagination Library today.

😢 Tyler visited Dollywood last year, drives with an Imagination Library license plate, and is rather gutted.

Editor's note: This newsletter has been updated to reflect new "Scrap Paper" exhibit hours shared by OSU.