Questions on Rail Travel

The trip will take 1.5 hours approximately. Frecciarossa and Italo are comparable with Italo offering free wifi, actually Freccia does as well you just need an Italian cell number to get the access code. This may be different now.

The Tiburtina station is less crazy and more modern. Tiburtina is easy to get to by Metro, Bus, Taxi, or the local train from Termini.

I thought Italo was going to start using Termini now?

Italo does use Termini now and the train to Florence SMN stops at Tiburtina. I guess the real differentiators are schedule and price. Trenitalia has more frequent trains but Italo has newer trains. if you book early, Trenitalia has super economy rates (around 19 euros) which are really good. Italo has 19 euro fares available as well. Also, you should be able to get the cheap rates 120 days in advance of your scheduled train.

Jonathan,

Either rail network would be good, as they both travel at the same speed and use the same station in Florence. Italo does have a very few trains that depart from Termini to Florence, but the majority are from Tiburtina or Ostiense. On a relatively short 90 minute trip, I'm not as concerned about the "frills" such as free Wi-Fi.

As the previous reply mentioned, you can purchase heavily discounted Super Economy tickets well in advance for a good price. However, as these include compulsory seat reservations that are specific to train, date and departure time, you MUST use the train specified on the ticket. If you board another train (even by mistake), you'll face hefty fines which will be collected on the spot! Super Economy tickets are non-refundable and non-changeable, so choose carefully!

If you'd prefer to use Italo and depart from Tiburtina, it's an easy trip on the Metro, or take a Taxi. Taxi will add to the cost however, which might negate any savings on the tickets. On that particular route, using Trenitalia from Termini with pre-purchased tickets is probably the easiest solution.

Thanks for the info. One additional question, I remember in the past there were issues using my US credit card getting Trentalia tickets on their web site. Is that still a problem?

Thanks

I use my US-issued credit card online for purchasing tickets on Trenitalia.com. Perhaps your bank is blocking the transaction as possibly fraudulent if the bank doesn't know you are using the card for foreign transactions. If that's not the problem, call the trenitalia toll-free number and complete the transaction by phone, in English.

Thanks for the help and info