A longer version of this article appeared in The Columbian and The Daily News.
The Interstate 5 Bridge Replacement Program recently cleared another bureaucratic funding hurdle when Metro, Portland’s regional governing body, voted to spend $1.9 billion in funding that had already been awarded to the project.
The vote moves the roughly $6 billion project forward even as questions remain about whether a megaproject bridging two blue states can succeed under President Donald Trump. U.S. Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., has raised alarms about Trump’s administration pulling funding for projects in Democratic-leaning states…