Wow, somehow I missed the previous ones. In the article it says that 10 bridges collapsed in Italy in the past 5 years! You think you'd start to wonder. That doesn't sound normal. You say that the bridge was high end and was well maintained. Well, in the article you shared it says that that's what the private company said that was in charge of maintenance. This is what another person had to say:
In 2012, Giovanni Calvini, then the head of the Genoa branch of the Italian employers organization Confindustria, when seeking his organization's backing for new roads, warned in an interview with Genoa's Il Secolo XIX newspaper, "This junta mustn't think that the realization of public works isn't their problem. Because look, when in 10 years' time the Morandi Bridge collapses, and we all get stuck in traffic jams for hours, we will remember the names of the people who said 'No.'''
It looks like there really were warning signs that something should be done. Now dozens of people are dead. I couldn't really understand from the article, does the EU control all the road budgets? Like countries pay taxes to the EU and the EU chooses how to spread it around?