Rail Pass

There are only a select few situations where buying a rail pass is worth it and it is never worth it to buy for a single country. Even less worth it in countries like Italy (also Spain and France), where they require you to reserve a seat which is an additional cost to the pass (about €10 per trip in Italy). It is far more cost effective to buy point to point tickets through italiarail.com The more ahead of time you book, the more you save, so book as soon as possible once you know your travel dates.

Trenitalia has a good app where you can look up schedules, book a ticket / seat reservation. Sometimes it gets a little wonky but all in all a good app.
I hope you enjoy Bolzano as much as I did. Are you planning to see Otzi the Iceman if the museum is open?
Have a wonderful trip.

Remember, even with a pass in Italy you have to pay about $10/leg for a require seat reservation. Required on all trains except the Regional. A pass is not worth it if you use several Regional trains.

In Italy a ticket from the Trenitalia or Freccia app includes the reservation in the basic fare so there is no €10 to pay when you use a pass.

will be around $100

Firenze SM Novella - Siena : € 9.5 pp, one way. (the bus stops closer to central Siena, aka the top of the hill)
Firenze SM Novella - Orvieto: € 16.9 pp one way or Siena - Orvieto: € 11.8 pp one way
Orvieto - Roma Termini: € 8.6 pp one way
Venezia S. Lucia - Bolzano: € 24.4
Bolzano - Desenzano Del Garda-Sirmione: 17.25 € pp one way.
I made a search picking only Regionale trains, the trains with no reserved seats and no discounts for advance purchases (In short, you can't pay either less or more than the prices I listed).

Add the price for an high speed train from somewhere in Northern Italy to Florence and an € 82 pass could be a good idea.

It all comes down on how easy using those passes is and on hidden costs. Can you freely board any regionale train without queuing at the counter? Will you have to get a seat reservation before getting on high speed trains?
Did you compare Trenitalia's and Italotreno's fares for high speed trains? How are you going to/from airports? By Train? Will the pass be accepted on that airport train?

Remember, even with a pass in Italy you have to pay about $10/leg for a require seat reservation.

@Frank: I think the new pass sold directly by Trenitalia has no fees for the mandatory seat reservations on high speed trains. You still have to reserve a seat online, but it's free.

Helpful info. Since the tickets are so reasonable we're going to buy as we go. My husband thinks we will be fine for our Sept 19 trip but I'm so stressed about the possibily of having to quarantined in Italy I can't think of much else.

Thank you as always

Jo,

I also wanted to recommend using P-P tickets rather than a rail pass, for the reasons articulated by the others. A pass is rarely more cost effective than P-P tickets, especially with the Regionale trains. As you may know, Regionale tickets purchased at local stations must be validated prior to use on the day of travel. Also, tickets for the express trains (ie: Freccia) are specific to train, date and departure time, and can only be used on the one train listed on the ticket.

In the past, I've bought all tickets for express trains from a ticket agency such as Trainline - https://www.thetrainline.com/?redirected=true . They sell tickets for both major networks in Italy (as well as others around Europe) so that kind of provides "one stop shopping" (I believe they now charge a small fee, but I've never found that to be a problem).

I do a combination of Regional trains and Fast Trains (Freccia)... and have used both Italo and Trenitalia. I have also booked on Loco2.com which is now:
https://www.raileurope.com/en

Fast Trains imo are better to book ahead of time while regional can be same day (dont forget to validate)
To me Italy has a fantastic public transportation system which is why i never rent a car when I am there. I have never used a rail pass there because its not cost effective.

My daughter studied abroad in Florence so when I visited her she took the reigns on travel and I never paid attention to the the rail service we used. I see Trenitalia, ItaliaRail, Frecciarossa, raileurope, etc.

Can someone please help me understand all of these railways? Which ones I should use and for what? Are some of these just booking sites? I did check out the info on RS's site but it didn't specifically name the rail lines.

Thank you,
Truly Confused!!

cowman, you should probably start a new thread with your question, for more people to see it. But a short answer is that Raileurope is a third party reseller of tickets. Trains are operated by Trenitalia and ItaliaRail. Frecciarossa is the name of Trenitalia's special high speed line. For planning purposes, sometimes third party sites don't show all available trains, and may sell you tickets before the actual railway has set the schedule, expecting that the schedule wont change significantly.

A good site for explaining all things rail in Europe is the Man in Seat 61"
".

No, trains are operated by 2 competing companies:

• trenitalia.com that runs local (Regionale), long distance (Intercity) and high speed trains (Freccia-something).
• italotreno.it/en that runs only high speed trains on major routes. This summer they are serving also the Adriatic "slow" line between Bologna and Bari.

The "right train" can be either Trenitalia's or Italotreno's, it depends on when you are travelling, on where are you going and on when you are getting your tickets. There are third party apps to compare fares and schedules.

ItaliaRail is a reputable re-seller, you could call it just a booking site. I think they do not mark up prices, but they have no sale agreement with Italotreno so they won't display Italotreno's trains on their search results page.

RailEurope is a re-seller that shows only the trains they have tickets to sell for. They also try to push their passes without explaining that those passes are more expensive and more inconvenient than point-to-point tickets purchased in advance on the official sites I wrote above.

Then there are a few local Railway companies owned by privates or Regional Governments, but most of them have been acquired by Trenitalia or have some agreement with Trenitalia. The relevant exception for tourists is EAV, the Neapolitan loss-making company that, among many others, runs the Circumvesuviana trains between Naples and Sorrento via Pompeii and Herculaneum.

Posted by Dario
Italy

Thank you Dario!! This is extremely helpful and exactly what I was looking for.

Cin Cin