The 50-year-old bridge that collapsed in Pittsburgh on Friday had been rated as poor on a recent inspection report, and transportation officials and engineering experts say funding has not kept up with the need for repairs and replacements nationwide.

President Joe Biden, who was in Pittsburgh on Friday to promote a $1 trillion infrastructure package, said it was miraculous that there were no fatalities and that only a few people were injured in the predawn collapse in Frick Park.

Butler County has 499 bridges, 355 of them are under the jurisdiction of the state Department of Transportation.

Of those 355 bridges, 127 are in good condition, 191 are in fair condition and 37 are in poor condition, according to the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation.

The American Road & Transportation Builders Association, which advocates for transportation infrastructure investment, issues an annual report on the state of U.S. bridges based on inspection reports. The most recent report, using 2021 data, showed more than 43,500 of the country’s roughly 615,000 bridges are rated poor.

That number is about 4,000 less than those reported to be in poor condition nationally in 2017. Advocates at the association say that it’s a glacial pace for repairs and that dedicated funding is critical to catch up.

In Pennsylvania, the association’s report showed 3,353 bridges with a poor rating, second behind Iowa, which has 4,571. More than 2,100 of the commonwealth’s bridges have reached a level of deterioration requiring weight or traffic limits.

The Federal Highway Administration’s bridge inspection program was developed after the 1967 Silver Bridge collapse in West Virginia, which killed 46 people. It has expanded over the years to include state- and municipally-owned bridges, not just those in the federal highway system, and to include rules for underwater inspections and regulations for qualifications of inspectors.

Generally, bridges are inspected every two years, with some older or lower-rated bridges inspected more often.

The municipal or state entities that own and maintain the bridges submit those inspection reports to state departments of transportation, which are required to provide them to the Federal Highway Administration.

Last month, Gov. Tom Wolf stood alongside U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg to launch the largest bridge repair program in American history, made possible by the passage of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. Pennsylvania is set to receive $1.6 billion to fix more than 3,000 bridges across the commonwealth.

Pennsylvania will receive the third most money for bridges under the federal infrastructure bill, one of seven states to receive at least $1 billion over five years.

Let’s get moving to get these bridges repaired quickly before they crumble to the ground.

— JGG