Nathan Bernier
Nathan Bernier is a transportation reporter at KUT 90.5 whose work follows how major infrastructure projects and everyday mobility decisions reshape life in Austin. He focuses on highways, public transit and the airport, with particular attention to the widening of Interstate 35 and its impact on nearby communities and businesses. His reporting combines explanatory coverage of complex plans with close attention to how construction, noise and displacement affect people who live and work along the region’s busiest corridors. He treats transportation as a civic and economic story, using clear language to connect engineering details and agency decisions to daily realities for drivers, transit riders, pedestrians and cyclists. Before taking over the transportation beat in 2021, he worked in multiple reporting and hosting roles at the station, which shaped his emphasis on concise, accessible coverage.
I-35 expansion and freeway corridors
Bernier’s most sustained work centers on the long-running effort to widen and remake Interstate 35 through Austin. He produced a special digital project, “Everything you need to know about the I-35 expansion,” that breaks down the plan, its phases and its implications, and that has been recognized in broadcast journalism awards.
He has reported on what TxDOT is building behind new sound walls, including one of the largest tunnels the city has seen, explaining how that structure fits into the broader freeway overhaul.
He documents how residents and businesses in the path of a wider I-35 prepare to be pushed out, treating displacement, property acquisition and uncertainty as central parts of the transportation story. His coverage tracks growing noise concerns as construction nears, documenting how sound and traffic volumes change for people living along the corridor.
In the story about the flagship location of P. Terry’s at Capital Plaza, he ties a well-known local restaurant’s closure directly to the expansion schedule, showing how freeway design decisions reverberate through the local economy. Across these pieces, he returns to the physical space of the freeway and its frontage roads, using specific locations and voices to animate what could otherwise read as abstract project documents.
Transit agencies, Project Connect and light rail
Beyond highway work, Bernier reports extensively on transit agencies and the multibillion-dollar Project Connect expansion.
His beat includes the governance and finances of Austin’s light-rail authority, such as a story on the agency scrapping a planned $47 million office build-out and instead expanding into a neighboring building. In that piece, he focuses on how a change in real estate plans affects budgets, timelines and public perceptions of the rail project’s priorities. His author biography stresses that he covers Project Connect as one of the “big projects” reshaping how people move around the city, indicating that he treats zoning around stations, funding decisions and construction sequencing as part of the same mobility narrative. Awards citations describe his transportation reporting as “helmed” by him, underscoring that his coverage of transit projects is not occasional but a continuous specialty beat.
He regularly frames transit stories in terms of what they mean for commutes and neighborhood connectivity, rather than limiting them to agency press releases or boardroom debates.
Airport growth and everyday mobility
Bernier also tracks the rapid growth of the Austin airport and the systems that keep it safe. His coverage includes a story about new runway safety technology being installed at the airport, explaining how the equipment works and how it could have prevented a prior near miss. In discussing airport expansion, he links technical changes like runway and taxiway upgrades to broader questions about passenger volumes and regional growth.
His beat extends to the “daily changes” that affect how people walk, bike and drive, covering routine adjustments to streets, trails and local transit that accumulate into major shifts in mobility over time. Through the Austin Transportation Podcast, he contributes produced stories and interviews that look at congestion on corridors like I-35 and MoPac, alternatives such as Capital Metro service and scooters, and decisions by local government that shape how easily people get from one place to another.
That audio work mirrors his reporting tone: focused on how policy and infrastructure intersect with everyday travel rather than treating transportation as a purely technical or political subject.
Reporting style, methods and recognition
Bernier’s reporting is defined by a commitment to demystifying transportation jargon and exposing what is happening inside agencies that control roads, transit and airports. He describes his own approach as breaking down complex terms into clear, everyday language, and his work consistently translates design schematics, environmental reviews and procurement documents into plain descriptions of what will change on the ground. Coverage of the I-35 caps plan, tunnels and displacement shows the same pattern: he reads deeply into state and city plans but writes in direct, unadorned prose anchored in specific locations and people.
A profile of his work notes that he relies heavily on government PDFs from departments such as public safety and the city transportation office, alongside public information requests, which supports his emphasis on documented agency decisions.
His transportation reporting has earned top honors in radio reporter categories and beat reporting awards, including the Charles E. Green Award for Best Radio Reporter from a Texas journalism foundation. Multiple award citations single out individual pieces on I-35 expansion and airport technology, reinforcing that his coverage stands out for both sound design and investigative depth. He maintains a visible presence as a transportation reporter for KUT 90.5 on social platforms, using them to share stories, solicit tips and point audiences to longer-form digital and audio projects about mobility.
4 more automobile journalists.
Abhirup Roy
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Alana Cameron
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Alex Allan
Alex Allan is an award-winning multimedia journalist at Your Sunset Country whose key distinction is anchoring transport and automotive coverage inside national economic and policy stories. He works an automobile beat within a wider focus on economics, federal policy and transportation news, concentrating on fuel prices, transportation labour disputes and major fiscal and regulatory decisions that shape mobility. He reports on fuel prices, inflation and the cost of driving, federal budgets and deficits, clean energy and emissions policy, trade deals and regulatory changes, transportation labour disputes, national programs, elections, criminal justice reform, language policy and conservation. Across these subjects he links everyday costs, drivers, travellers and logistics to inflation data, fiscal plans, trade rules and institutional reforms, using detailed reporting on numbers, agreements and programs to show how people and goods move.
Aliza Savira
Aliza Savira is an automobiles reporter for MSN who treats electric efficiency in small cars as the main story, not a side note. She focuses on how electric vehicle technology and efficiency are reshaping the compact segment, using new EV concepts to show how manufacturers now compete on energy use, range and packaging. Her work sits at the intersection of engineering choices, market positioning and everyday driving needs. She uses concept cars as signals of future trends in compact EVs, linking individual projects to wider shifts in range, comfort and safety within tight footprints. She writes in plain language, explaining design trade-offs through real use cases like urban driving, charging habits and ownership costs. Her reporting occupies a space between enthusiast coverage and industry analysis, showing how changes in EV technology affect the cars people may realistically drive next.