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2 hours ago
2
04 Oct, 2025
(Steeped in AI, I'm fully aware that I'm writing this as the words Agent, Agentic, and Agency are over-used in conversations, at least in what I believe my reader's circles are, but bear with me)
As someone who enjoys exploring and walking around in cities and has also moved around a fair bit, I sometimes find myself having strong opinions about public transit. I don't have a car yet, and my primary experience of my favorite cities has been through public transit.
I've come to notice that living life in cities, as in the suburbs (or in between), has a cost for me. Not monetary only, but also of effort, time, energy - attributes which deeply color my experience.
In cities, you get to move around dense experiences cheaply, and quickly, but it involves effort and energy. Cheap public transit fare often allows you to skip traffic snarls but comes at the cost of walking and moving between stops and planning ahead of time. Cars are expensive and time-consuming, but are comfortable, and don't require as much planning as taking the bus or train.
During the pandemic, while waiting for the San Francisco MUNI, which was a no-show for the second arrival - it hadn't arrived the past two times it was supposed to at that stop - I felt exasperated and furious at the uselessness of the expected arrival time flickering on the announcements board, having missed the beginning of a movie. Because the theater wasn't within reasonable walking distance, I felt quite limited in my ability to move around.
In my angry and helpless state, it seemed that no-one respected my agency to move around freely. Not the designers of the city, not the driver of the train, not my employer. I was severely limited in how far I could reasonably travel, even though I was given the freedom to travel as far as I could.
I think there's a difference between being free to do something (having the freedom or right to use public transit to get to my movie) and actually being able to do it (having the public transit system amenable to a reasonably arbitrary commute).
Freedom is what you're promised. Agency is what you actually get.
What's the gap, though? I'm not sure, but I think it's design. It's the design of the system.
The system that's designed for agency should look and feel, I think, significantly different from a system that's designed for freedom. Freedom is a promise or a declaration of the deliverables, but agency is those promises being delivered.
Through good design.
In systems with poor agency but high freedom, I think one experiences dissatisfaction, disappointment, and frustration, often concurrently, and unknowingly. Which is why I think we should pursue the design of systems with reasonably high agency. As we'll see later, I think there can be too much of agency which can lead to agency fatigue.
I think systems of high freedom, poor agency are quite common - in our personal lives as well as professional and public lives. And they usually compound.
Personally, you have the freedom to learn about whatever you want to. But that's only as good as the tools you use to learn - a space to learn, requiring specific kinds of aids to learn, interest, possible genetic predisposition - can limit your agency. The same goes for being able to build and maintain relationships. Or exercise better!
Professionally, an organization can provide the freedom to its employees to grow in their careers, and maintain a well-balanced life. But the quality of leadership, growth feedback, and pay structures are dimensions of significant impact on professional agency.
Public systems are almost the easiest of all to fall into the category of systems with poor agency. Housing systems, transit systems, healthcare providers, food quality systems, financial, legal, and political systems, are all obviously (to me) poor agency systems. What is promised by each as a fundamental freedom is very hard to achieve at a reasonable level.
At the same time, a system that is high agency doesn't necessarily mean a great system. Some amount of trust in the system is essential to high agency systems. Having the agency to have healthy food shouldn't mean that the only way to do that is grow your own food. Or for quality housing/health research, to do your own at each decision point!
Can a system be poor freedom, but high design? I'm not sure. I think that would mean a system of rebellion or revolution. Which isn't desirable in and of itself, I think.
So you have to have a system that is both high freedom, and reasonably high agency. It's a duality instead of a dichotomy.
What stops a system from being very high on the agency front, limiting reinvention of the wheel at every step? I'm not sure.
Also, how does one get to a system that is high agency? I haven't gotten to that part yet.
In the meantime, can the T-line (or the 22) please be on time?
