As cocky pointed out the bridge is owned and inspected by the state. The money for maintenance of the bridge came from the fed. The state decides how they want to use it. For whatever reason they chose to use a majority of those funds constructing this light rail system. You can go on and on all you want about this federal funding bill. The money was allocatted at the state level. And since you apparently haven't looked it up yet, the dems have been in control of this state bascially since the beginning of time.