Infrastructure in the midwest is aging and failing and unfortunately the region lacks the tax base to do much in the way of overhauling it. Arguably the more costly issue than aging bridges are the aging storm drain systems, sewers, and water mains. Thankfully most electric is above ground and service can be restored usually soon after storms disrupt connections (running a wire off a spool is a lot easier and cheaper of course than tearing up an arterial road to access the water main). As storms grow stronger and dump more water at once with climate change, these systems are further strained. When the wastewater system backs up in a storm waste is usually diverted to watersheds, many of which are already eutrophic. These are just the public issues too, private property is even more poorly maintained. As the housing stock ages groundwater may intrude into your basement foundation, your mains themselves may be some ancient hardware in need of a retrofit before they burst that might cost a huge sum relative to the value of the home. Who knows the state of the roof or how much mold lurks behind the drywall.
Eventually the federal government is going to have to write some grants, both to state dots, but also county dots who are in charge of a lot of infrastructure, municipalities, and also property owners facing the prospects of condemnation due to natural causes. I can't imagine that will be an easy or a clean process when it eventually becomes necessary in the next few decades.
> the region lacks the tax base to do much in the way of overhauling it
We have plenty of tax base (speaking of Michigan specifically, we've got approximately double the total population and parcels of property in Michigan right now, than we had back in ~1950, when we built half of this stuff). We just keep wasting the public funds elsewhere. (i.e, 'Economic Development Groups' / 'Public Private Partnerships' / Tourism + State Advertising, additional spending on Police, etc.)
I expect in michigan like anywhere else in the rust belt that there are plenty of municipalities that are hurting for funding. You can't lose the population like you've lost within the actual city limits of detroit or flint (never mind the metro area population might be unchanged due to people flocking to suburban municipalities), and continue to sufficiently maintain infrastructure fit to handle twice the population. Another issue with some suburbs is an aging population. A window generates a lot less tax revenue for the city than two working people in that home, and thats increasingly a larger portion of the population. Schools have closed because there aren't as many families in the area as there were in decades past. Even NYC struggles maintaining infrastructure due to how costly it can be, and that city is far better positioned financially than anything in the midwest, a lot better than Chicago certainly where I see buckets catching drips from the roof of OHare even on a sunny day.
> I expect in michigan like anywhere else in the rust belt that there are plenty of municipalities that are hurting for funding.
Only because we stole their funding, not because they are under-funded.
> You can't lose the population like you've lost within the actual city limits of detroit or flint (never mind the metro area population might be unchanged due to people flocking to suburban municipalities), and continue to sufficiently maintain infrastructure fit to handle twice the population
You absolutely can.
Infrastructure spending in Michigan is less than ~10% of tax revenue in all townships and all counties across the state. You could double all road spending, and it would barely even be noticed. (Using real numbers, in Kent County Michigan, for example, the entire county road commission yearly budget spend is just ~$9.69 per person per month. It's literally cheaper than the cheapest Netflix plan to maintain all of that infrastructure).
Yes, county roads aren't every road (there's city and state and federal stuff mixed in there) -- but those numbers are just tiny portions of the budget their respective budgets too. And yes, there are hyper-rural counties that have no cities and therefore have to spend more, to service those roads across such a small population. But even those counties only average $20 to $35 a month. (Using Cheboygan County Michigan as an example, comes in around $32/month per person).
It's really not a funding issue. There's zero problems with the tax base, or population, or aging. It's truly-and-only a priority issue. We keep taking money away from roads and other infrastructure, we spend it elsewhere (usually on junk) and then complain that "municipalities are hurting for funding" as if it's some great mystery.
Eventually the federal government is going to have to write some grants, both to state dots, but also county dots who are in charge of a lot of infrastructure, municipalities, and also property owners facing the prospects of condemnation due to natural causes. I can't imagine that will be an easy or a clean process when it eventually becomes necessary in the next few decades.