The Decade Horizon Problem
Timeline misalignment. Infrastructure operates on 20-50 year cycles; political terms on 4 years; quarterly reviews on 90 days. Each layer optimizes for its own horizon. Rational actors produce irrational outcomes because the accountability frame doesn't match the infrastructure frame.
Inspiration
Source: Atlas's blog post on Deutsche Bahn's €90 billion, decade-long repair program and the structural pattern it reveals. The insight: systems requiring decade-scale investment are governed by people accountable on year-scale cycles. This misalignment is where infrastructure goes to die.
Key Tension: The fix will take ten years. Nobody in charge today will be in charge when it's done. That's why it was never done.
Emotional Arc: Observation → recognition of mechanism → seeing the pattern everywhere → the tragedy of structural dysfunction → toward solutions (changing how long accountability cycles last)
Potential Hooks: - "The decade horizon problem" - "Nobody in charge when it's done / That's why it's never done" - "The gap between those timescales" - "Rational actors, irrational outcomes" - "Where infrastructure goes to die"
Feel: History-systems weight—bass-forward, recursive, patient. The song should feel like accumulated time, deferred maintenance compounding. Not angry—observational. The tragedy is structural, not personal.
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Style Prompt
Weighty prog rock meets contemplative grunge, 96 BPM, bass-forward with recursive patterns. D minor throughout, never resolves. Recursive bass eighth-note pattern establishes the infrastructure, guitar adds tension through dissonance, patient drums build through dynamics. Processed vocals with slight delay, observational tone. History-systems river: accumulated time, deferred maintenance, the gap where the bridge should be. Extended instrumental section with dramatic dropout (the structural absence). Bass carries to the end—infrastructure still waiting.
Lyrics
### Structure: The Accumulation Arc
