In the aftermath of the disastrous Minnesota bridge collapse, David Ekern, the commissioner of the Virginia Department of Transportation, weighs in on plans to upgrade the condition of state bridges. Virginia, which has always put roadway maintenance ahead of funding new projects, seems to have its priorities in the right place. In today’s Times-Dispatch Ekern writes:

Virginia’s 2004-09 Six-Year Transportation Improvement Program allocated more than $350 million in fiscal year 2004 to projects involving bridges. More than $600 million was allocated to bridge-related projects for fiscal years 2005-09 in that program. This trend has continued and has allowed us to build or rehabilitate 810 structures. …

In the current 2008-13 Six-Year Improvement Program, more than $2.1 billion is scheduled for projects that include bridge work.

Of course, Ekern warns, the state’s 20,823 bridges get older and the cost to repair and replace them “increase every day.”